SOFTWARE SERVICE NOTIFICATIONS BASED UPON SOFTWARE USAGE, CONFIGURATION, AND DEPLOYMENT TOPOLOGY

• US 20130042227A1
• Filed: 03/29/2012
• Published: 02/14/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 08/11/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Little, Rodney A., Nigul, Leho
• Granted Patent: US 8,707,292 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/168
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/61 Installation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/64 Retargetable
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/65 Updates security arrangements therefor G06F21/57

Abstract

Software configuration information and topological information associated with a group of software program instances installed on at least one computing device are tracked. An available software update is identified for at least one of the group of software program instances. At least one software update suggestion rule that specifies a target software configuration and a target topological dependency to which the available software update applies is evaluated against the tracked software configuration information and topological information. A determination is made as to whether the available software update is targeted to the tracked software configuration information and topological information based upon the evaluation of the at least one software update suggestion rule. A notification of the available software update is provided in response to determining that the available software update is targeted to the tracked software configuration information and topological information.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

tracking software configuration information and topological information associated with a plurality of software program instances installed on at least one computing device;

identifying an available software update for at least one of the plurality of software program instances;

evaluating at least one software update suggestion rule that specifies a target software configuration and a target topological dependency to which the available software update applies against the tracked software configuration information and topological information;

determining whether the available software update is targeted to the tracked software configuration information and topological information based upon the evaluation of the at least one software update suggestion rule; and

providing a notification of the available software update in response to determining that the available software update is targeted to the tracked software configuration information and topological information.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising postponing the notification of the available software update in response to determining that the available software update is not targeted to the tracked software configuration information and topological information.

3. The method of claim 1, where tracking the software configuration information and the topological information associated with the plurality of software program instances installed on the at least one computing device comprises:

instructing each of the at least one computing device to send the software configuration information and the topological information in response to any change in at least one of the software configuration information and the topological information; and

receiving at least one of changed software configuration information and changed topological information from at least one of the at least one computing device.

4. The method of claim 1, where tracking the software configuration information and the topological information associated with the plurality of software program instances installed on the at least one computing device comprises:

querying each of the at least one computing device for the software configuration information and the topological information associated with at least one installed instance of the plurality of software program instances; and

receiving at least one of changed software configuration information and changed topological information from at least one computing device in response to querying each of the at least one computing device.

5. The method of claim 4, where querying each of the at least one computing device for the software configuration information and the topological information comprises querying each of the at least one computing device in response to each expiration of a pre-configured time interval.

6. The method of claim 1, where identifying the available software update for at least one of the plurality of software program instances comprises receiving a notification of the available software update from a software update server.

7. The method of claim 1, where evaluating the at least one software update suggestion rule that specifies the target software configuration and the target topological dependency to which the available software update applies against the tracked software configuration information and topological information comprises, for each of the at least one computing device:

comparing the target software configuration with the tracked software configuration information associated with the plurality of software program instances installed on the at least one computing device;

comparing the target topological dependency with the tracked topological information associated with each of the plurality of software program instances installed on the at least one computing device; and

determining whether the target software configuration matches the tracked software configuration information and whether the target topological dependency matches the tracked topological information.

8. The method of claim 1, where the at least one software update suggestion rule further specifies a target software usage pattern to which the available software update applies, and further comprising:

tracking user software usage information associated with the plurality of software program instances installed on the at least one computing device;

evaluating the at least one software update suggestion rule that further specifies the target software usage pattern to which the available software update applies against the tracked user software usage information;

determining whether the available software update is targeted to the user software usage information based upon the evaluation of the at least one software update suggestion rule; and

where providing the notification of the available software update in response to determining that the available software update is targeted to the tracked software configuration information and topological information comprises providing the notification of the available software update in response to determining that the available software update is targeted to the tracked software configuration information, topological information, and user software usage information.