Un-installation of inactive or removed peripheral device drivers

• US 7,577,769 B2
• Filed: 03/01/2005
• Issued: 08/18/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 03/01/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Jodh, Santosh S., Cobb, Jason T., Cavalaris, James G.
• Primary Examiner(s): Tsai; Henry W. H.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Borromeo; Juanito C
• Application Number:
  US11/069,109
• Publication Number:
  US 20060200594A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,631 Days
• Field of Search: 710/18, 710/19
• US Class Current: 710/18
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4411 Configuring for operating with peripheral devices; Loading of device drivers

Abstract

The subject invention relates to systems and methods that automatically monitor computer platform components and initiate automated resource recovery procedures based on detected periods of component inactivity. In one aspect, an automated maintenance system for computer resources is provided. The system includes a controller that monitors installation and removal of system components that cooperate to facilitate various operations of a computer. A threshold component supplies time out or decay values for the devices to determine inactive periods of the devices, whereby the controller removes persistent memory references for the devices based in part on the time out values. Supervisory threshold functions can be provided to cause the system to perform maintenance operations at other desired intervals in order to allow periods of device inactivity while maintaining desired component information on the respective system.

Claims

1. An automated computer implemented maintenance system stored in a tangible computer readable storage medium for computer resources, comprising:

a controller that monitors installation and removal of one or more devices that cooperate to facilitate operations of a computer;

a threshold component that supplies time out values for the devices to determine inactive periods of the devices, the controller removes persistent memory references from a system registry for at least one of the devices based at least in part on the time out values;

an initialization and monitoring component to enumerate device objects, wherein the initialization and monitoring component is a Plug and Play (PnP) manager for a USB port; and

a rules component that permits selective unistallation of at least one of the devices based on one or more rules that set the time out values for the devices depending on a classification of the devices based at least on a bus type of the devices; and

a comparator function that compares the time out values of the devices with respective decay values to determine if automated procedures related to one or more un-installation procedures that remove references of a component'"'"'s resources in persistent storage are to be invoked, wherein the decay values indicate respective periods of inactivity of the devices and the un-installation procedures reside as standard software removal procedures that are automatically invoked by the maintenance system.

2. The system of claim 1, the rules component includes rules relating to a maximum limit of potential hardware in view of a determined resource size.

3. The system of claim 1, the rules component includes rules relating to removing marked items based upon a predetermined number of non-present devices.

4. The system of claim 1, the PnP manager operates as a kernel mode or a user mode.

5. The system of claim 1, further comprising a user interface to initialize one or more properties that determine resource removal.

6. The system of claim 1, the controller removes memory references as part of a separate thread of execution per device.

7. A method for reclaiming inactive computer resources, comprising:

enumerating one or more devices installed on a computer system;

setting a threshold value for each device installed on the system;

associating an activity value for each device;

incrementing the activity value for at least one non-responding device;

automatically comparing the threshold value and the activity value during a computer background operation;

automatically running an uninstall procedure for the non-responding device based in part on the activity value and one or more rule sets applied to the device uninstall procedure based upon a classification of the device; and

automatically removing memory references from a system registry based in part on decay values set in accordance with a classification scheme for the devices depending on a bus type of the devices wherein the decay values specify a number of days each of the devices can be inactive before running the uninstall procedure for the non-responding device.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising automatically invoking the background operations in accordance with predetermined intervals.

9. The method of claim 7, further comprising configuring one or more decay properties for a device or a subset of devices.

10. A system to facilitate computer maintenance operations, comprising:

tangible storage means for reading a threshold value for one or more devices installed on a system;

tangible storage means for setting a decay value for each of the devices that specifies a count of days that a device can be inactive before it is automatically uninstalled;

tangible storage means for changing the decay value upon detecting an inactive device; and

tangible storage means for automatically removing memory references based in part on the decay value and a classification scheme for the inactive device wherein devices belonging to different classification schemes have different rules associated therewith for the automatic removal of memory references based on a bus type of each of the devices.