Systems and methods for state management of networked systems

• US 7,613,804 B2
• Filed: 11/25/2003
• Issued: 11/03/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 11/25/2003
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Raden, Gary P., Soemo, Thomas M., Melo, Eduardo da Fonseca, Butler, Lisa M., Moerloos, Richard J. Jr., Ekmekci, Tolga Bayram
• Primary Examiner(s): JEAN GILLES, JUDE
• Application Number:
  US10/721,726
• Publication Number:
  US 20050114501A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,170 Days
• Field of Search: 709200-203, 709217-224, 709/228, 709/208, 370/392, 370/258, 370/252
• US Class Current: 709/224
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/22 comprising specially adapted graphical user interfaces [GUI]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/02 Capturing of monitoring data
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0805 by checking availability
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0876 Network utilisation, e.g. volume of load or congestion level
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/14 using software, i.e. software packages network security related monitoring H04L63/1408
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/16 Threshold monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99935 Query augmenting and refining, e.g. inexact access

Abstract

The present invention leverages a data gathering service to provide information regarding a network system'"'"'s health, performance and/or utilization via a computing entity, local and/or remote. This provides an optimized means to aggregate a single network'"'"'s data and/or multiple networks'"'"' data, decreasing the amount of effort required by system administrators to keep a network operational and/or to provide control of its utilization and/or update a system'"'"'s state. In one instance of the present invention, a data gathering service aggregates data from systems and provides access to this information via a communication means. In another instance of the present invention, aggregated data is utilized to provide manual and/or automatic control of one or more aspects of a system'"'"'s utilization and/or state by an entity and/or a person.

Claims

1. A system embodied on a computer-readable storage medium that facilitates determining a state of a networked system, comprising:

a component that obtains system data corresponding to a system component that resides on a first networked system and to a system component that resides on a second network system, the second networked system is external to the first networked system; and

an aggregator that aggregates the system data corresponding to the first networked system and the second networked system in accordance with predetermined rules, analyzes at least a subset of the system data and generates an output comprising hidden information obtained via data mining that identifies trends occurring across the first and second networked systems and corresponding to respective states of a subset of components of the first and second networked systems, the output utilized to automatically limit utilization of at least one aspect of the first or second networked system according to a defined limit on aggregate utilization of resources of at least one such system.

2. The system of claim 1, additionally comprising a remote access component that enables manual control over the system component or the second system component and provides a user with remote access to the output.

3. The system of claim 1, the component comprising a polling component that polls the system components to obtain the system data.

4. The system of claim 1, the aggregator comprising a distributed database engine.

5. The system of claim 1, the predetermined rules employ a user control parameter to filter and aggregate system data specified by a user of the system.

6. The system of claim 1, at least one of the system components comprising a system component that sends data to the component unprompted.

7. The system of claim 6, the unprompted system component utilizes at least one of unicasting, multicasting, or broadcasting techniques to send data to the component.

8. The system of claim 1, the system components comprising a plurality of components on a server of the first networked system or the second networked system.

9. The system of claim 1, the system components comprising at least one of a running process, a data source, or a data log.

10. The system of claim 1, the hidden information comprising at least one of system diagnosis information or system prognosis information of the respective networked systems.

11. The system of claim 1, the output comprising a user customizable output.

12. The system of claim 1, the output comprising a status report.

13. The system of claim 12, the status report relating to at least one of system performance data, system health data, or system utilization data of the first and second networked systems.

14. The system of claim 1, the output comprising at least one schema table to provide optimal access of data relating to the output.

15. The system of claim 1, the output utilized to detect faulty errors in at least one of the networked systems.

16. The system of claim 1, the output utilized to provide automatic software updates to at least one of the system components in response to the state of the subset of components of the first and second networked systems.

17. The system of claim 1, the output comprising at least one system control parameter.

18. The system of claim 17, the system control parameter comprising at least one of a load shed command or a load balancing command.

19. The system of claim 17, the system control parameter comprising a security preservation action to maintain security of at least one networked system.

20. The system of claim 17, the system control parameter comprising a remedial action to maintain operation of at least one system component on the first or second networked systems.

21. The system of claim 1, the state comprising at least one of a previous state, a current state, or a future state.

22. The system of claim 1, the state comprising a health status state of the first or second networked systems.

23. The system of claim 22, the health status state comprising at least one of a previous health status state, a current health status state, or a future health status state.

24. The system of claim 1, at least a portion of the system data corresponding to the system components is generated by at least one of a health monitor, a performance monitor, or a utilization monitor.

31. The system of claim 1, employed to provide a remotely accessible state determination service.

32. The system of claim 31, the state determination service comprising an aggregation, analysis, and control service for at least one networked system pertaining to at least one system administrator, wherein a security action is implemented by the state determination service for the first networked system or the second networked system based on an input from the at least one system administrator.

34. A computer readable medium having stored thereon computer executable components of the system of claim 1.

36. A device employing the system of claim 1 comprising at least one of a computer, a server, or a handheld electronic device.

25. A computer-implemented method for facilitating state determination of a networked system, comprising:

obtaining system data corresponding to a system component that resides on a first networked system and a system component that resides on a second networked system, the first and second networked systems do not share a direct communication link, the system data contains at least information regarding utilization of system resources pertaining to the first and second networked systems;

aggregating, according to predetermined rules, at least a portion of the system data corresponding to at least a subset of the system components;

analyzing at least a portion of the aggregated system data based on a user control parameter to extract information specified by a system user from the aggregated data;

employing the extracted information to generate an output corresponding to respective states of the subset of the system components, the output comprising data trends obtained by data mining information pertaining to the respective states of the system components;

utilizing the output to provide an automatic software update to at least one system component to mitigate a detected error state; and

masking alerts associated with the error state when a software update is not available.

26. The method of claim 25, further comprising:

sending the output to a selectable recipient at a selectable rate in a selectable manner.

27. The method of claim 25, further comprising:

customizing the output according to a set of rules determined by a user.

28. The method of claim 25, further comprising:

controlling an aspect of the networked system in response to the output corresponding to the state of the subset of the system components.

29. The method of claim 28, the aspect comprising an operational system parameter responsible for maintaining operation of the networked system.

33. The method of claim 25 employed in a multiple networked system service environment to determine and predict common errors across at least a subset of the networked systems.

35. A device employing the method of claim 25 comprising at least one of a computer, a server, or a handheld electronic device.

30. A system embodied on a computer-readable storage medium that facilitates determining a state of a networked system, comprising:

means for obtaining system data corresponding to at least a subset of a plurality of system components that reside on a first networked system and a second networked system, the system data contains at least information regarding utilization of system resources;

means for aggregating at least a portion of the obtained data, the aggregated data filtered with a user control parameter specified by a system user;

means for analyzing at least a subset of the filtered data to generate an output corresponding to respective states of the subset of system components of the first networked system and the second networked system;

means for prioritizing utilization of at least one resource on the first or second networked system; and

means for automatically curtailing utilization of a resource by a first user of the networked system when a second user with a higher utilization priority requires the same resource.