DATA LOCATIONS TEMPLATE BASED APPLICATION-DATA ASSOCIATION AND ITS USE FOR POLICY BASED MANAGEMENT

• US 20080229277A1
• Filed: 05/30/2008
• Published: 09/18/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 06/19/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Magoutis, Konstantinos, Devarakonda, Murthy V., Vogl, Norbert G.
• Granted Patent: US 8,261,232 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/104
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/60 Software deployment
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/44505 Configuring for program initiating, e.g. using registry, configuration files
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0853 by actively collecting configuration information or by backing up configuration information

Abstract

Method and system are disclosed for automatically discovering associations between applications and data in multi-tiered distributed systems. The method in one aspect uses a machine-readable specification of a model or template that describes use and transformation of data by software components. The method additionally utilizes a model of system configuration and appropriate runtime support to mine information available from systems management software present in enterprise systems. The application-data association discovery process performs a traversal of the distributed system configuration graph with actions taken during this traversal driven by the contents of the templates for the software components present in the system. The results of the application-data association discovery process are stored in a database and may be used to specify application-specific information lifecycle management (ILM) policy or as input to impact analysis tools in access control and antivirus systems.

Claims

1. A system for automatically discovering associations between applications and data in a multi-tiered distributed system, comprising:

system configuration template description modeling a system configuration of a computer system, the system configuration template description including at least description of one or more software components on the computer system;

software template description modeling at least one of use and transformation of data by one or more software components on a computer system, each software component on the computer system having a corresponding software template description;

a processor operable to extract information associated with the computer system to use for creating the system configuration template description and the software template description, the processor further operable to traverse the system configuration template description and the software template description to discover application and data associations.

2. The system of claim 1, further including:

a repository for storing the discovered applications and data relationship.

3. The system of claim 1, further including:

a repository for storing at least one of the system configuration template description and the software template description.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the software template description is created on demand.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the software template description is retrieved from a repository.

6. The system of claim 1, further including:

a system configuration meta-model including at least a definition of distributed system infrastructure;

a first software component meta-model including at least a definition of at least one of use and transformation of data by one or more software components;

a second software component meta-model extending the first software component meta-model to include at least installation-specific information related to the at least one of use and transformation of data by one or more software components,

wherein the processor is further operable to build the system configuration template description and the software template description using the system configuration meta-model, the first software component meta-model, and the software component meta-model.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein at least one of the system configuration meta-model, the first software component meta-model, and the second software component meta-model are extensible.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the processor is further operable to enable management policies using the discovered application and data associations.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the system configuration template description and the software template description are distributedly located on different computer systems.

10. A method for automatically discovering associations between applications and data, comprising:

modeling a system configuration of a computer system using a predefined template defining distributed system infrastructure, the modeled system configuration including at least description of one or more software components in the computer system;

modeling one or more software components described in the modeled system configuration using a predefined software component template, the modeled one or more software components including at least description of at least one of use and transformation of data by the one or more software components;

extending the modeled one or more software components to include at least installation-specific information related to the at least one of use and transformation of data by one or more software components; and

traversing the modeled system configuration and the one or more software components to discover application and data associations.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein at least one of the steps of modeling are performed automatically using a software modeling tool.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein at least one of the steps of modeling are performed using user input.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the traversing includes traversing a graph representing the modeled system configuration.

14. The method of claim 10, wherein the traversing includes invoking one or more remote procedure calls to retrieve information from a remote location.

15. The method of claim 10, wherein the traversing includes invoking application program interface to retrieve information from a remote location.

16. The method of claim 10, further including using the discovered application and data associations to plan management policy.

17. A method for automatically discovering associations between applications and data, comprising:

providing a system configuration meta-model including at least a definition of distributed system infrastructure;

providing a first software component meta-model including at least a definition of at least one of use and transformation of data by one or more software components; and

providing a second software component meta-model extending the first software component meta-model to include at least installation-specific information related to the at least one of use and transformation of data by one or more software components,

wherein one or more instances of the system configuration meta-model, the first software component meta-model, and the second software component meta-model may be created and populated to describe a computer system configuration and traversed to discover application and data associations in a computer system.

18. The method of claim 17, further including:

providing a set of computer instructions that automatically traverse and discover the application and data associations.

19. A program storage device readable by machine, tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable by the machine to perform a method of automatically discovering associations between applications and data, comprising:

modeling a system configuration of a computer system using a predefined template defining distributed system infrastructure, the modeled system configuration including at least description of one or more software components in the computer system;

modeling one or more software components described in the modeled system configuration using a predefined software component template, the modeled one or more software components including at least description of at least one of use and transformation of data by the one or more software components;

extending the modeled one or more software components to include at least installation-specific information related to the at least one of use and transformation of data by one or more software components; and

traversing the modeled system configuration and the one or more software components to discover application and data associations.

20. The program storage device of claim 19, wherein the traversing includes invoking one or more functions to retrieve information from one or more remote locations.