PROVISIONING AND ACTIVATING HARDWARE RESOURCES

• US 20180219728A1
• Filed: 01/30/2017
• Published: 08/02/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 01/30/2017
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Hewlett Packard Enterprise Development LP (Hewlett-Packard Enterprise Company)
• Original Assignee: Hewlett Packard Enterprise Development LP (Hewlett-Packard Enterprise Company)
• Inventors: Beyh, Yehia S., Roeling, Fredrick M., Lowe, Jonathan Jay, Reddy, Jagadish Vattigunta, Muthu, Dharmendra
• Granted Patent: US 11,095,501 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0806 for initial configuration or provisioning, e.g. plug-and-play
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0895 Configuration of virtualised networks or elements, e.g. virtualised network function or OpenFlow elements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/40 using virtualisation of network functions or resources, e.g. SDN or NFV entities
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0876 Network utilisation, e.g. volume of load or congestion level
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/16 Threshold monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/20 the monitoring system or the monitored elements being virtualised, abstracted or software-defined entities, e.g. SDN or NFV

Abstract

Examples relate to provisioning and activating hardware devices. In one example, a computing device may receive a request for a hardware resource; identify, in response to the request, a new hardware resource having hardware attributes indicating at least one capability of the new hardware resource; determine, based on the hardware attributes, a hardware template for provisioning the new hardware resource; configure the new hardware resource using the hardware template; and activate the new hardware resource in a cluster of at least one hardware device.

Claims

1. A computing device for managing hardware resources, the computing device comprising:

a hardware processor; and

a data storage device storing instructions that, when executed by the hardware processor, cause the hardware processor to;

receive a request for a hardware resource;

identify, in response to the request, a new hardware resource having hardware attributes indicating at least one capability of the new hardware resource;

determine, based on the hardware attributes, a hardware template for provisioning the new hardware resource, the hardware template specifying network communications settings for the new hardware resource to communicate with a cluster of at least one hardware device;

configure the new hardware resource using the hardware template; and

activate the new hardware resource in the cluster.

2. The computing device of claim 1, wherein:

the request specifies a hardware attribute or a capability; and

the new hardware resource is identified based on the hardware attribute or capability specified by the request.

3. The computing device of claim 1, wherein:

the new hardware resource is a compute server; and

the hardware template is a compute server template.

4. The computing device of claim 3, wherein the compute server is configured by using the hardware template to:

deploy an operating system on the compute server;

configure network settings of the compute server;

identify software based on the request; and

install the identified software on the compute server.

5. The computing device of claim 1, wherein the instructions further cause the hardware processor to:

receive input specifying at least one configuration option, and wherein the new hardware resource is configured based on the at least one configuration option.

6. The computing device of claim 5, wherein:

the request is received from an application; and

the input is received from the application.

7. The computing device of claim 5, wherein the instructions further cause the hardware processor to:

provide a user interface for receiving input from a user, the user interface including the at least one configuration option, and wherein;

the request is received from a first user; and

the input is provided by the first user through the user interface.

8. The computing device of claim 2, wherein the new hardware resource is one of a plurality of hardware resources included in a hardware resource pool.

9. The computing device of claim 1, wherein the new hardware resource is activated by i) adding the new hardware resource to an existing cluster of hardware resources, or ii) creating a new cluster of hardware resources for the new hardware resource.

10. A method for managing hardware resources, implemented by a hardware processor, the method comprising:

identifying, for a new hardware resource, hardware attributes indicating at least one capability of the new hardware resource;

receiving a hardware request indicating a particular capability of the new hardware resource;

identifying, in response to the request, a plurality of hardware resources that each have hardware attributes indicating the particular capability, the plurality of hardware resources including the new hardware resource;

determining, based on the hardware attributes, a hardware template for provisioning the new hardware resource in response to the hardware request, the hardware template specifying network communications settings for the new hardware resource to communicate with an activated cluster of at least one hardware device;

configuring the new hardware resource using the hardware template; and

adding the new hardware resource to the activated cluster.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the method further comprises:

receiving input specifying at least one configuration option, and wherein the new hardware resource is configured based on the at least one configuration option.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein:

the request is received from an application; and

the input is received from the application.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein:

the new hardware resource is a storage node; and

the hardware template is a storage node template.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the storage node is configured by using the hardware template to:

configure network settings of the storage node;

format the storage node;

identify software based on the request; and

install the identified software on the storage node.

15. A non-transitory computer readable medium including instructions that, when executed by a data processor, cause the data processor to perform operations comprising:

receive a request for a hardware resource, the request indicating a capability of the hardware resource;

identify, in response to the request, a plurality of available hardware resources, each of the plurality of available hardware resources having hardware attributes indicating at least one capability of the available hardware resource;

select a new hardware resource from the plurality of available hardware resources based on the capability indicated by the request;

determine, based on the hardware attributes of the new hardware resource, a hardware template for provisioning the new hardware resource;

configure the new hardware resource using the hardware template, the hardware template specifying network communications settings for the new hardware resource to communicate with a cluster of at least one hardware device; and

activate the new hardware resource in the cluster.

16. The computer readable medium of claim 15, wherein the instructions further cause the data processor to:

receive input specifying at least one configuration option, and wherein the new hardware resource is configured based on the at least one configuration option.

17. The computer readable medium of claim 16, wherein:

the request is received from an application; and

the input is received from the application.

18. The computer readable medium of claim 15, wherein:

the new hardware resource is a compute server; and

the hardware template is a compute server template.

19. The computer readable medium of claim 18, wherein the compute server is configured by:

deploying an operating system on the compute server;

configuring network settings of the compute server;

identifying software based on the request; and

installing the identified software on the compute server.

20. The computer readable medium of claim 15, wherein:

the new hardware resource is a storage device; and

the hardware template is a storage device template.