Statistical Identification of Instances During Reconciliation Process

• US 20110238637A1
• Filed: 08/20/2010
• Published: 09/29/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 03/26/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: BMC Software Incorporated (KKR & Co., Inc.)
• Original Assignee: BMC Software Incorporated (KKR & Co., Inc.)
• Inventors: Humphrey, Eric, Morozov, Vitaly
• Granted Patent: US 8,712,979 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/694
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2365 Ensuring data consistency and integrity
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/24564 Applying rules; Deductive queries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2462 Approximate or statistical queries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/273 Asynchronous replication or reconciliation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/285 Clustering or classification
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/90324 using system suggestions

Abstract

A system for reconciling object for a configuration management databases employs statistical rules to reduce the amount of manual identification required by conventional reconciliation techniques. As users manually identify matches between source and target datasets, statistical rules are developed based on the criteria used for matching. Those statistical rules are then used for future matching. A threshold value is adjusted as the statistical rules are used, incrementing the threshold value when the rule successfully matches source and target objects. If the threshold value exceeds a predetermined acceptance value, the system may automatically accept a match made by a statistical rule. Otherwise, suggestions of possibly applicable rules may be presented to a user, who may use the suggested rules to match objects, causing adjustment of the threshold value associated with the suggested rules used.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

selecting a first object from a source dataset;

evaluating a rule against the first object and a second object of a target dataset of a configuration management database;

marking the first object as identified with the second object upon successful evaluation of the rule if a threshold value associated with the rule exceeds a predetermined acceptance value; and

adjusting the threshold value responsive to the act of marking.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

marking the first object for manual identification responsive to the act of evaluating;

displaying information about the rule for a user performing manual identification of the first object; and

adjusting the threshold value responsive to manual identification by the user.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the act of adjusting the threshold value responsive to a manual identification by the user comprises:

incrementing the threshold value if the user uses the rule to match the first object with an object in the configuration management database.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein the act of adjusting the threshold value responsive to a manual identification by the user comprises:

decrementing the threshold value if the user does not use the rule to match the first object with an object in a configuration management database.

5. The method of claim 2, wherein the act of displaying information about the rule for a user performing manual identification of the first object comprises:

displaying a plurality of rules for the user; and

ordering the plurality of rules responsive to their associated threshold values.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the act of adjusting the threshold value responsive to the act of marking comprises:

incrementing the threshold value associated with the rule responsive to successful evaluation of the rule.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the act of adjusting the threshold value responsive to the act of marking comprises:

decrementing the threshold value associated with the rule responsive to unsuccessful evaluation of the rule.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the act of evaluating a rule comprises:

selecting a ruleset responsive to a characteristic of the first object;

determining whether the ruleset contains any rules; and

selecting a next rule from the ruleset.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the act of marking the first object is identified with a second object is not performed if the first object has previously been marked as identified with the second object.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the act of selecting a first object from the source dataset comprises:

selecting the first object from a plurality of objects of the source dataset marked for statistical identification.

11. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining criteria used by a user to manually identify the first object and object of the target dataset;

from

generating the rule responsive to the act of determining criteria; and

associating a predetermined default value for the threshold value associated with the rule.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

configuring the predetermined default value for the threshold value; and

configuring the predetermined acceptance value.

13. A non-transitory computer readable medium with instructions for a programmable control device stored thereon wherein the instructions cause the programmable control device to perform the method of claim 1.

14. A networked computer system comprising:

a plurality of computers communicatively coupled, at least one of the plurality of computers programmed to perform at least a portion of the method of claim 1, wherein the entire method of claim 1 is performed collectively by the plurality of computers.

15. A configuration management database system, comprising:

a configuration management database server;

a configuration management database, coupled to the configuration management database server;

a reconciliation engine, coupled to the configuration management database server, and configured to match a plurality of objects provided to the configuration management database system from a plurality of source datasets with objects contained in the configuration management database; and

a statistical rules engine, coupled to the configuration management database server and configured to apply a statistical rule to match first object of the plurality of objects with a second object contained in the configuration management database responsive to a threshold value associated with the statistical rule,

wherein the first object was not matched with any objects contained in the configuration management database by the reconciliation engine.

16. The configuration management database system of claim 15, wherein the reconciliation engine is integrated with the statistical rules engine.

17. The configuration management database system of claim 15,

wherein the reconciliation engine is configured to mark objects of the plurality of objects for statistical identification or manual identification, and

wherein the first object is marked for statistical identification.

18. The configuration management database system of claim 15, wherein the configuration management database server is configured to receive reconciliation requests from a configuration management database client and to transmit reconciliation results to the configuration management database client.

19. The configuration management database system of claim 15, wherein the configuration management database server is configured to discover objects provided by a plurality of source datasets.

20. The configuration management database system of claim 15, wherein the statistical rules engine is configured to suggest the statistical rule to a user performing manual identification.