AUTOMATED TOPOLOGY CHANGE DETECTION AND POLICY BASED PROVISIONING AND REMEDIATION IN INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SYSTEMS

• US 20120271937A1
• Filed: 04/21/2011
• Published: 10/25/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 04/20/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Level 3 Communications LLC (Lumen Technologies, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Level 3 Communications LLC (Lumen Technologies, Inc.)
• Inventors: Borowicz, James Edward, Rumer, Eric Alden, Hotes, Craig W., Bandi, Madhukar, Cotten, Ronald Dean, Wein, Kevin Dean, Haase, Richard David
• Granted Patent: US 9,928,483 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/224
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management

Abstract

Aspects of the present disclosure involve systems, methods, computer program products, and the like, that provide automated topology change detection and policy based provisioning and remediation in information technology systems, among other functions and advantages.

Claims

1. A method of managing an information technology system comprising:

automatically detecting, using at least one processor, a topology change of a service in an information technology environment, the topology change involving a change to at least one component of the service; and

at least one of automatically provisioning or automatically remediating the at least one component of the service based on a policy.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein automatically detecting a topology change of a service in an information technology environment, the topology change involving a change to at least one component of the service comprises:

obtaining a first auto-discovery scan of the information technology environment;

obtaining a pattern for the service;

applying the pattern to the auto-discovery scan to obtain a first information technology topology of the service.

3. The method of claim 2 further comprising:

obtaining a second auto-discovery scan of the information technology environment at a time different from the first scan;

applying the pattern to the second auto-discovery scan to obtain a second information technology topology of the service; and

automatically detecting the topology change of the service by identifying differences between the first auto-discovery scan and the second auto-discovery scan.

4. The method of claim 3 wherein each scan comprises a discovery and

dependency mapping of the IT environment, and further comprising:

generating a first signature for the service, the first signature for the service including a first discovery and dependency mapping of the IT environment relevant to the service;

extracting service memberships of the service from the first signature to generate the first information technology topology, and saving the first information technology topology to a configuration management database;

generating a second signature for the service, the second signature for the service including a second discovery and dependency mapping of the IT environment relevant to the service;

extracting service memberships of the service from the second signature to generate the second information technology topology, and saving the second information technology topology to a configuration management database; and

automatically detecting the topology change of the service by comparing the first information technology topology with the second information technology topology.

5. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

executing an automatic remediation operation, using at least one processor, to conform the at least one component of the service to the policy when the at least one component does not conform to the policy.

6. The method of claim 5 further comprising:

executing an automated workflow to perform execution of the automatic remediation operation.

7. The method of claim 5 further comprising:

automatically opening a ticket for manual remediation of the at least one component of the service to conform the component to the policy when the automatic remediation of the component to conform to the policy fails.

8. The method of claim 5 wherein the policy comprises one or more of a back-up policy, a monitoring policy, a performance data gathering policy, a decommissioning policy, and a contact policy.

9. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

executing an automatic provisioning operation to provision the at least one component of the service in conformance with the policy.

13. The system of claim 2 wherein the one or more processors coupled with one or more tangible computer readable media containing instructions, which when executed, perform the operations of:

obtaining a second auto-discovery scan of the information technology environment at a time different from the first scan;

applying the pattern to the second auto-discovery scan to obtain a second information technology topology of the service; and

automatically detecting the topology change of the service by identifying differences between the first auto-discovery scan and the second auto-discovery scan.

14. The system of claim 13 wherein each scan comprises a discovery and dependency mapping of the IT environment, and wherein the one or more processors coupled with one or more tangible computer readable media containing instructions, which when executed, perform the operations of:

generating a first signature for the service, the first signature for the service including a first discovery and dependency mapping of the IT environment relevant to the service;

extracting service memberships of the service from the first signature to generate the first information technology topology, and saving the first information technology topology to a configuration management database;

generating a second signature for the service, the second signature for the service including a second discovery and dependency mapping of the IT environment relevant to the service;

extracting service memberships of the service from the second signature to generate the second information technology topology, and saving the second information technology topology to a configuration management database; and

automatically detecting the topology change of the service by comparing the first information technology topology with the second information technology topology.

19. The method of claim 1 wherein the one or more processors coupled with one or more tangible computer readable media containing instructions, which when executed, perform the operations of:

executing an automatic provisioning operation to provision the at least one component of the service in conformance with the policy.

10. A method of managing an information technology system comprising:

applying a unique pattern of a particular service to automatically discovered discovery and dependency mapping of an IT environment in a first state and the IT environment in a second state to identify components of the particular service in the first state and the second state;

identifying component topology changes of the particular service between the first state and the second state;

automatically altering some or all components of the service associated with the topology change based on a policy.

20. A tangible computer readable media containing one or more executable instructions configured to perform the method of claim 10.

11. A system for information technology management comprising:

one or more processors coupled with one or more tangible computer readable media containing instructions, which when executed, perform the operations of;

automatically detecting a topology change of a service in an information technology environment, the topology change involving a change to at least one component of the service; and

at least one of automatically provisioning or automatically remediating the at least one component of the service based on a policy.

12. The system of claim 11 wherein the operation of automatically detecting a topology change of a service in an information technology environment, the topology change involving a change to at least one component of the service comprises:

obtaining a first auto-discovery scan of the information technology environment;

obtaining a pattern for the service;

applying the pattern to the auto-discovery scan to obtain a first information technology topology of the service.

15. The system of claim 11 wherein the one or more processors coupled with one or more tangible computer readable media containing instructions, which when executed, perform the operations of:

executing an automatic remediation operation to conform the at least one component of the service to the policy when the at least one component does not conform to the policy.

16. The system of claim 15 wherein the one or more processors coupled with one or more tangible computer readable media containing instructions, which when executed, perform the operations of:

executing an automated workflow to perform execution of the automatic remediation operation.

17. The system of claim 15 wherein the one or more processors coupled with one or more tangible computer readable media containing instructions, which when executed, perform the operations of:

automatically opening a ticket for manual remediation of the at least one component of the service to conform the component to the policy when the automatic remediation of the component to conform to the policy fails.

18. The system of claim 15 wherein the policy comprises one or more of a back-up policy, a monitoring policy, a performance data gathering policy, a decommissioning policy, and a contact policy.