System and method for self-supporting applications

• US 20060136869A1
• Filed: 02/09/2004
• Published: 06/22/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 02/11/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Computer Associates Think Inc. (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Computer Associates Think Inc. (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Lamm, Jacob, Waschke, Marvin, Shapiro, Yaakov
• Granted Patent: US 8,098,809 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/109
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0748 in a remote unit communicating with a single-box computer node experiencing an error/fault remote testing G06F11/2294
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0793 Remedial or corrective actions recovery from an exception in an instruction pipeline G06F9/3861; by retry G06F11/1402; for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity H04L69/40
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

A method and system self-supportable devices and applications are provided. The method and system in one embodiment allows devices and applications to automatically communicate and service themselves, for example, by checking knowledgebase services and other services for instructions on how to handle an exception. In another embodiment, the devices and applications automatically initiate actions needed to handle the exception.

Claims

1. A method of providing self-supporting service consumers, comprising:

allowing a service consumer to automatically consult one or more service policy rules associated with the service consumer to request a service;

automatically initiating one or more actions associated with the service policy and the requested service; and

automatically invoking one or more service provider tools based on the service policy and the requested service.

2. The method of claim 1, further including:

communicating one or more service events that occurred as a result of the automatically initiating one or more actions and the automatically invoking one or more service provider tools.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the communicating includes logging the one or more service events.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the consumer includes hardware devices, software applications, or combinations thereof.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the software applications include over-the-counter applications, custom applications, or combinations thereof.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the requested service is a request to provide a solution to fault that occurred in the service consumer.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more service provider tools include knowledgebase, trouble ticketing tool, escalation tool, workflow tool, software delivery tool, or combinations thereof.

8. The method of claim 1, further including allowing the service policy to be modified based on the automatic initiating and the automatic invoking steps.

9. A self-supporting service consumer system, comprising:

one or more service consumers; and

a container operable to house one or more service policies associated with respective one or more service consumers, the container further operable to provide access to one or more service provider tools, the one or more service consumers operable to automatically consult one or more service policies to receive a service and the one or more service consumer further operable to automatically invoke one or more service provider tools based on the service policy and the service via the container.

10. The system of claim 9, further including:

a web-enabled application programming interface residing in the one or more service consumers; and

a web service communicating with the container, wherein the one or more service consumers communicate to the container via the web-enabled application programming interface and the web service over the world wide web.

11. The system of claim 9, wherein the one or more service consumers include hardware devices, software applications, or combinations thereof.

12. The system of claim 9, wherein the service includes handling an exception that occurred in the service consumer.

13. The system of claim 9, wherein the one or more service provider tools include knowledgebase, trouble ticketing tool, escalation tool, workflow tool, software delivery tool, or combinations thereof.

14. The system of claim 9, further including:

an analysis tool operable to receive events occurring as a result of the service provided to the one or more consumers, the analysis tool further operable to modify the service policy based on received events.

15. A program storage device readable by machine, tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable by the machine to perform method steps of providing self- supporting service consumers, comprising:

allowing a service consumer to automatically consult one or more service policy rules associated with the service consumer to request a service;

automatically initiating one or more actions associated with the service policy and the requested service; and

automatically invoking one or more service provider tools based on the service policy and the requested service.

16. The program device of claim 15, further including:

communicating one or more service events that occurred as a result of the automatically initiating one or more actions and the automatically invoking one or more service provider tools.

17. The program device of claim 15, wherein the communicating includes logging the one or more service events.

18. The program device of claim 15, wherein the consumer includes hardware devices, software applications, or combinations thereof.

19. The program device of claim 15, wherein the one or more service provider tools include knowledgebase, trouble ticketing tool, escalation tool, workflow tool, software delivery tool, or combinations thereof.

20. The program device of claim 15, further including allowing the service policy to be modified based on the automatic initiating and the automatic invoking steps.