Non-Intrusive Measurement of Content Quality Using Dry Runs with Roll-back

• US 20110321012A1
• Filed: 06/25/2010
• Published: 12/29/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 06/25/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Samantaray, Sarmistha, Sriramadhesikan, Sampathkumar
• Granted Patent: US 9,092,576 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/122
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/008 Reliability or availability analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/368 for test version control, e.g. updating test cases to a new software version
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3688 for test execution, e.g. scheduling of test suites

Abstract

Validation and determination of business application program content quality destined for loading on a target production computing environment is automated by receiving an application program into a controlled production computing environment, and, during a dry run test in the production computing environment, logging changes to content from an initial state as loaded by the application program; applying a business rule to the content during data loading to validate against business objects; capturing validation errors produced by the validation and structural change commands to the content into a log file; and automatically rolling back changes made to the content during the dry run test to the initial state thereby avoiding committing content changes to the production computing environment.

Claims

1. An automated method for validating and determining data and content quality of a business application to be loaded in a target production computing environment comprising:

receiving an application program into a controlled production computing environment; and

during a dry run test of the application program in the controlled production computing environment;

logging changes to content from an initial state as loaded by the application program;

applying a business rule to the content during data loading to validate against a business object;

capturing validation errors produced by the validation and structural change commands to the content into a log file stored in at least one computer readable memory device; and

automatically rolling back changes made to the content during the dry run test to the initial state thereby avoiding committing content changes to the production computing environment;

wherein the application program is executed by a computing platform having a processor; and

wherein the content is stored in a computer readable memory device.

2. The automated method as set forth in claim 1 wherein the rolling back of changes to an initial state comprises rolling back on a per-record basis in a data base or data table.

3. The automated method as set forth in claim 1 wherein the rolling back of changes to an initial state comprises rolling back on a logical group basis.

4. The automated method as set forth in claim 1 wherein the rolling back of changes to an initial state comprises rolling back on a per-business-object basis.

5. The automated method as set forth in claim 1 wherein the rolling back of changes to an initial state comprises rolling back on a per-document basis.

6. The automated method as set forth in claim 1 wherein the structural changes are recorded into a log using Data Definition Language (DDL) while preventing the implementation of the structural changes indicated by the logged commands.

7. The automated method as set forth in claim 1 wherein the content comprises an Extensible Markup Language document.

8. A computer program product for validating and determining data and content quality of a business application to be loaded in a target production computing environment, the computer program product comprising:

a computer readable storage memory device having computer readable program code embodied therewith, the computer readable program code configured to;

receive an application program into a controlled production computing environment; and

during a dry run tests of the application program in the controlled production computing environment;

log changes to content from an initial state as loaded by the application program;

apply a business rule to the content during data loading to validate against a business object;

capture validation errors produced by the validation and structural change commands to the content into a log file stored in at least one computer readable memory device; and

automatically roll back changes made to the content during the dry run test to the initial state thereby avoiding committing content changes to the production computing environment;

wherein the content is stored in a computer readable memory device.

9. The computer program product as set forth in claim 8 wherein the rolling back of changes to an initial state comprises rolling back on a per-record basis in a data base or data table.

10. The computer program product as set forth in claim 8 wherein the rolling back of changes to an initial state comprises rolling back on a logical group basis.

11. The computer program product as set forth in claim 8 wherein the rolling back of changes to an initial state comprises rolling back on a per-business-object basis.

12. The computer program product as set forth in claim 8 wherein the rolling back of changes to an initial state comprises rolling back on a per-document basis.

13. The computer program product as set forth in claim 8 wherein the structural changes are recorded into a log using Data Definition Language (DDL) while preventing the implementation of the structural changes indicated by the logged commands.

14. The computer program product as set forth in claim 8 wherein the content comprises an Extensible Markup Language document.

15. A system for validating and determining data and content quality of a business application to be loaded in a target controlled production computing environment, comprising:

a computing system having a processor configured to execute a logical process;

a receiver portion of the computing system receiving an application program into a controlled production computing environment;

a logger portion of the computing system which, during a dry run test of the application program in the controlled production computing environment, logs changes to content from an initial state as loaded by the application program;

a validator portion of the computing system applying a business rule to the content during data loading to validate against a business object;

an error capturer capturing validation errors produced by the validation and structural change commands to the content into a log file stored in at least one computer readable memory device; and

a content restorer automatically rolling back changes made to the content during the dry run test to the initial state thereby avoiding committing content changes to the production computing environment;

wherein the content is stored in a computer readable memory device.

16. The system as set forth in claim 15 wherein the content restorer is configured to rolling back changes on a per-record basis in a data base or data table.

17. The system as set forth in claim 15 wherein the content restorer is configured to rolling back changes on a logical group basis.

18. The system as set forth in claim 15 wherein the content restorer is configured to rolling back changes on a per-business-object basis.

19. The system as set forth in claim 15 wherein the content restorer is configured to rolling back changes on a per-document basis.

20. The system as set forth in claim 15 wherein the structural changes are recorded into a log using Data Definition Language (DDL) while preventing the implementation of the structural changes indicated by the logged commands.

21. The system as set forth in claim 15 wherein the content comprises an Extensible Markup Language document.