Automated application fail-over for coordinating applications with DBMS availability

• US 6,202,149 B1
• Filed: 09/30/1998
• Issued: 03/13/2001
• Est. Priority Date: 09/30/1998
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Teradata US, Inc. (Teradata Corporation)
• Original Assignee: NCR Corporation
• Inventors: Hedegard, Lynn Poul
• Primary Examiner(s): Lee, Thomas C.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Mai, Rijue
• Application Number:
  US09/164,258
• Time in Patent Office: 895 Days
• Field of Search: 713/1, 713/2, 713/100, 713/201, 707/100-104, 707/200-206, 395/112.04, 714/4, 714/6, 714/7, 714/39, 714/47, 709/223, 709/220, 709/221, 709/222, 710/8, 710/10, 712/15
• US Class Current: 713/100
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2023 Failover techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2035 without idle spare hardware
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2097 maintaining the standby controller/processing unit updated initialisation or re-synchronisation thereof G06F11/1658 and subgroups

Abstract

A method and apparatus for automatically redistributing tasks to reduce the effect of a computer outage on a computer network. The apparatus comprises at least one redundancy group comprised of one or more computing systems, comprised of one or more computing system partitions. The computing system partition includes copies of a database schema that are replicated at each computing system partition. The redundancy group monitors the status of the computing systems and the computing system partitions, and assigns a task to the computing systems based on the monitored status of the computing systems.

Claims

1. A data storage system comprising:

one or more computing systems connected through a network and organized into computing system partitions, where each computing system partition includes a physical copy of a database schema, and where each database schema is replicated on at least two of the computing system partitions organized logically as a redundancy group; and

a redundancy management component implemented in at least one of the computing systems and configured to monitor whether the computing system partitions in a redundancy group are functioning properly and, when one of the computing system partitions is not functioning properly, to reassign a task performed by that computing system partition to another computing system partition in the redundancy group.

2. The system of claim 1, where the reassigned task includes replication of the database across the computing system partitions.

3. The system of claim 1, where the reassigned task includes execution of application programs for use in manipulating data in the database.

4. The system of claim 1, where the redundancy management component is configured not to reassign the task back to the malfunctioning computing system partition when that computing system partition resumes normal operation.

5. The system of claim 1, where at least two of the computing system partitions in the redundancy group reside in two distinct computing systems.

6. The system of claim 1, where at least two of the computing system partitions in the redundancy group reside in a single computing system.

7. The system of claim 1, where at least one of the computing system partitions is included in two distinct redundancy groups.

8. The system of claim 1, where the redundancy management component is configured to add computing system partitions to or remove computing system partitions from the redundancy group.

9. A method for use in storing data in a computer network, comprising:

organizing one or more computing systems into computing system partitions, each including a physical copy of a database schema;

replicating each database schema on at least two of the computing system partitions and organizing these computing system partitions logically as a redundancy group;

configuring at least one of the computer systems to operate as a redundancy manager that monitors whether the computing system partitions in a redundancy group are functioning properly; and

when one of the computing system partitions is not functioning properly, configuring the redundancy manager to reassign a task performed by that computing system partition to another computing system partition in the redundancy group.

10. The method of claim 9, where reassigning the task includes reassigning the task of replicating the database across the computing system partitions.

11. The method of claim 9, where reassigning the task includes reassigning the task of executing application programs for use in manipulating data in the database.

12. The method of claim 9, further comprising configuring the redundancy manager not to reassign the task back to the malfunctioning computing system partition when that computing system partition resumes normal operation.

13. The method of claim 9, where organizing the computing systems into computing system partitions includes assigning two of the computing system partitions in the redundancy group to two distinct computing systems.

14. The method of claim 9, where organizing the computing systems into computing system partitions includes assigning at least two of the computing system partitions in the redundancy group to a single computing system.

15. The method of claim 9, where organizing the computing systems into computing system partitions includes assigning at least one of the computing system partitions to two distinct redundancy groups.

16. The method of claim 9, further comprising configuring the redundancy manager to add computing system partitions to or remove computing system partitions from the redundancy group.