System and method of enterprise systems and business impact management

• US 7,774,458 B2
• Filed: 08/24/2005
• Issued: 08/10/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 07/10/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: BMC Software Incorporated (KKR & Co., Inc.)
• Original Assignee: BMC Software Incorporated (KKR & Co., Inc.)
• Inventors: Lemercier, Bernard, Trinon, Jean-Marc, Pignault, Olivier, Moitroux, Philippe
• Primary Examiner(s): LAZARO, DAVID R
• Application Number:
  US11/211,360
• Publication Number:
  US 20050283445A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,812 Days
• Field of Search: 709223-226, 709/203, 705/1, 705 7- 10
• US Class Current: 709/224
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/063 Operations research, analysis or management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0633 Workflow analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06375 Prediction of business process outcome or impact based on a proposed change
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/067 Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/4015 using location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/06 Management of faults, events, alarms or notifications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/069 using logs of notifications; Post-processing of notifications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5009 Determining service level performance parameters or violations of service level contracts, e.g. violations of agreed response time or mean time between failures [MTBF]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5012 determining service availability, e.g. which services are available at a certain point in time
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5054 Automatic deployment of services triggered by the service manager, e.g. service implementation by automatic configuration of network components
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0817 by checking functioning

Abstract

A system architecture and a method for managing using a cellular architecture to allow multi-tier management of events such as the managing of the actual impact or the potential impact of IT infrastructure situations on business services. A preferred embodiment includes a high availability management backbone to frame monitoring operations using a cross-domain model where IT component events are abstracted into IT Aggregate events. By combining IT Aggregate events with transaction events, an operational representation of the business services is possible. Another feature is the ability to connect this information to dependent business user groups such as internal end-users or external customers for direct impact measurement. A web of peer-to-peer rule-based cellular event processors preferably using Dynamic Data Association constitutes management backbone crossed by event flows, the execution rules, and distributed set of dynamic inter-related object data rooted in the top data instances featuring the business services.

Claims

1. A method of monitoring a business service implemented on an infrastructure, the infrastructure having a plurality of components and a plurality of detectors, the method comprising:

associating business objects with processing cells distributed throughout the components of the infrastructure, each of the business objects associated with the business service and encompassing one or more business transactions, each of the business transactions encompassing a sequence of application transactions in a path of the components;

associating rules with the processing cells, the rules including a propagation rule defining how one processing cell sends a copy of a collected event to another processing cell that does not have the collected event, the rules including an aggregation rule defining how one collected event is combinable with another collected event;

collecting events with one or more of the processing cells running on one or more processing machines associated with the components, the events collected from one or more of the detectors;

organizing the collected events with the processing cells running on one or more of the processing machines associated with the components by propagating and aggregating the collected events amongst the processing cells using the business objects and the rules associated therewith; and

determining with one or more of the processing machines associated with the components an impact that the organized events have on the business service.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the business objects comprises one or more dependency objects, each of the dependency objects characterizing a dependency relationship between a dependent resource and a master resource in a business or application transaction associated with the business service.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the dependency objects comprises one or more impact propagation policies, each of the impact propagation policies characterizing an impact that a collected event has on the dependent or master resource.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein each of the business transactions encompass one or more site-specific business transactions for a specific site of the infrastructure, each of the site-specific business transactions encompassing a sequence of site-specific application transactions on a path of the components.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the business objects encompass one or more business user groups for the business transactions.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the events comprise status, availability, or performance of a component utilized by the business service.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the events comprise an indication of a problem at a component of the infrastructure utilized by the business service, an indication of a problem with an application utilized by the business service, an indication of a problem with a transaction associated with the business service, or an indication of a problem between components of the infrastructure utilized by the business service.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the rules comprise one or more of:

a rule relating two or more of the processing cells in a hierarchy, wherein organizing the collected events comprises propagating or aggregating an event collected by processing cells in the hierarchy based on the rule;

a rule relating two or more of the processing cells in a layer, wherein organizing the collected events comprises propagating or aggregating an event collected by processing cells in the layer based on the rule;

a rule relating two or more of the processing cells in the infrastructure according to a business or application transaction associated with the business service, wherein organizing the collected events comprises propagating or aggregating an event collected by processing cells in the business or application transaction based on the rule;

a rule defining a class of event to be handled by a processing cell;

a rule defining how a processing cell aggregates a first collected event with a second collected event at the same processing cell; and

a rule defining an executable action to be performed by a processing cell in response to a collected event.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the act of determining the impact comprises calculating a performance or an availability measurement of the components of the infrastructure utilized by the business service based on the organized events.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

implementing a sample transaction associated with the business service with at least one of the processing cells;

collecting events resulting from the sample transaction with one or more of the processing cells from one or more of the detectors;

organizing the collected events resulting from the sample transaction with the processing cells by propagating and aggregating the collected events amongst the processing cells using the business objects and the rules associated therewith; and

determining an impact that the organized events resulting from the sample transaction have on the business service.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the act of implementing the sample transaction comprises configuring the at least one processing cell with first information of the sample transaction, the at least one processing cell associated with a source location of the sample transaction, the first information being used to implement the sample transaction.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein the act of implementing the sample transaction comprises configuring one or more of the processing cells with second information of the sample transaction, the one or more processing cells associated with a path for the sample transaction, the second information being used to collect execution information of the sample transaction implemented on the infrastructure.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the act of implementing the sample transaction comprises executing the sample transaction at the at least one processing cell according to cycles having a frequency.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the act of executing the sample transaction comprises identifying each of the cycles of the sample transaction with a specific identification tag.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the act of executing the sample transaction comprises generating an execution confirmation event at the at least one processing cell, the execution confirmation event including a timestamp for the execution of the sample transaction and the specific identification tag.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein the act of collecting events resulting from the sample transaction comprises:

activating instrumentation functions with input data at the processing cells;

capturing execution information related to the sample transaction with the activated instrumentation functions; and

generating execution control events having timestamps and the specific identification tag in response to captured execution information.

17. A non-transitory computer readable medium having program instructions stored thereon for causing a computer system to perform a method of monitoring a business service implemented on an infrastructure, the infrastructure having a plurality of components and a plurality of detectors, the method comprising:

associating business objects with processing cells distributed throughout the components of the infrastructure, each of the business objects associated with the business service and encompassing one or more business transactions, each of the business transactions encompassing a sequence of application transactions in a path of the components;

associating rules with the processing cells, the rules including a propagation rule defining how one processing cell sends a copy of a collected event to another processing cell that does not have the collected event, the rules including an aggregation rule defining how one collected event is combinable with another collected event;

collecting events with one or more of the processing cells from one or more of the detectors;

organizing the collected events with the processing cells by propagating and aggregating the collected events amongst the processing cells using the business objects and the rules associated therewith; and

determining an impact that the organized events have on the business service.

19. The computer readable medium of claim 17, wherein the business objects comprises one or more dependency objects, each of the dependency objects characterizing a dependency relationship between a dependent resource and a master resource in a business or application transaction associated with the business service.

20. The computer readable medium of claim 19, wherein the dependency objects comprises one or more impact propagation policies, each of the impact propagation policies characterizing an impact that a collected event has on the dependent or master resource.

21. The computer readable medium of claim 17, wherein each of the business transactions encompass one or more site-specific business transactions for a specific site of the infrastructure, each of the site-specific business transactions encompassing a sequence of site-specific application transactions on a path of the components.

22. The computer readable medium of claim 17, wherein the business objects encompass one or more business user groups for the business transactions.

23. The computer readable medium of claim 17, wherein the events comprise status, availability, or performance of a component utilized by the business service.

24. The computer readable medium of claim 17, wherein the events comprise an indication of a problem at a component of the infrastructure utilized by the business service, an indication of a problem with an application utilized by the business service, an indication of a problem with a transaction associated with the business service, or an indication of a problem between components of the infrastructure utilized by the business service.

25. The computer readable medium of claim 17, wherein the rules comprise one or more of:

a rule relating two or more of the processing cells in a hierarchy, wherein organizing the collected events comprises propagating or aggregating an event collected by processing cells in the hierarchy based on the rule;

a rule relating two or more of the processing cells in a layer, wherein organizing the collected events comprises propagating or aggregating an event collected by processing cells in the layer based on the rule;

a rule relating two or more of the processing cells in the infrastructure according to a business or application transaction associated with the business service, wherein organizing the collected events comprises propagating or aggregating an event collected by processing cells in the business or application transaction based on the rule;

a rule defining a class of event to be handled by a processing cell;

a rule defining how a processing cell aggregates a first collected event with a second collected event at the same processing cell; and

a rule defining an executable action to be performed by a processing cell in response to a collected event.

26. The computer readable medium of claim 17, wherein the act of determining the impact comprises calculating a performance or an availability measurement of the components of the infrastructure utilized by the business service based on the organized events.

27. The computer readable medium of claim 17, further comprising:

implementing a sample transaction associated with the business service with at least one of the processing cells;

collecting events resulting from the sample transaction with one or more of the processing cells from one or more of the detectors;

organizing the collected events resulting from the sample transaction with the processing cells by propagating and aggregating the collected events amongst the processing cells using the business objects and the rules associated therewith; and

determining an impact that the organized events resulting from the sample transaction have on the business service.

28. The computer readable medium of claim 27, wherein the act of implementing the sample transaction comprises configuring the at least one processing cell with first information of the sample transaction, the at least one processing cell associated with a source location of the sample transaction, the first information being used to implement the sample transaction.

29. The computer readable medium of claim 27, wherein the act of implementing the sample transaction comprises configuring one or more of the processing cells with second information of the sample transaction, the one or more processing cells associated with a path for the sample transaction, the second information being used to collect execution information of the sample transaction implemented on the infrastructure.

30. The computer readable medium of claim 27, wherein the act of implementing the sample transaction comprises executing the sample transaction at the at least one processing cell according to cycles having a frequency.

31. The computer readable medium of claim 30, wherein the act of executing the sample transaction comprises identifying each of the cycles of the sample transaction with a specific identification tag.

32. The computer readable medium of claim 31, wherein the act of executing the sample transaction comprises generating an execution confirmation event at the at least one processing cell, the execution confirmation event including a timestamp for the execution of the sample transaction and the specific identification tag.

33. The computer readable medium of claim 31, wherein the act of collecting events resulting from the sample transaction comprises:

activating instrumentation functions with input data at the processing cells;

capturing execution information related to the sample transaction with the activated instrumentation functions; and

generating execution control events having timestamps and the specific identification tag in response to captured execution information.

18. A networked computer system, comprising:

a plurality of components of an infrastructure communicatively coupled together, the components including processing machines associated therewith and having

a plurality of detectors distributed throughout the infrastructure; and

a plurality of processing cells distributed throughout the infrastructure, the processing cells running on the processing machines associated with the components and having business objects and rules associated therewith,

each of the business objects associated with the business service and encompassing one or more business transactions, each of the business transactions encompassing a sequence of application transactions in a path of the components,

the rules including a propagation rule defining how one processing cell sends a copy of a collected event to another processing cell that does not having the collected event,

the rules including an aggregation rule defining how one collected event is combinable with another collected event;

wherein one or more of the processing cells collect events related to the business service from one or more of the detectors, and

wherein the processing cells organize the collected events using the business objects and the rules associated therewith and determine an impact that the organized events have on the business service.

34. The system of claim 18, wherein the business objects comprises one or more dependency objects, each of the dependency objects characterizing a dependency relationship between a dependent resource and a master resource in a business or application transaction associated with the business service.

35. The system of claim 34, wherein the dependency objects comprises one or more impact propagation policies, each of the impact propagation policies characterizing an impact that a collected event has on the dependent or master resource.

36. The system of claim 18, wherein each of the business transactions encompass one or more site-specific business transactions for a specific site of the infrastructure, each of the site-specific business transactions encompassing a sequence of site-specific application transactions on a path of the components.

37. The system of claim 18, wherein the business objects encompass one or more business user groups for the business transactions.

38. The system of claim 18, wherein the events comprise status, availability, or performance of a component utilized by the business service.

39. The system of claim 18, wherein the events comprise an indication of a problem at a component of the infrastructure utilized by the business service, an indication of a problem with an application utilized by the business service, an indication of a problem with a transaction associated with the business service, or an indication of a problem between components of the infrastructure utilized by the business service.

40. The system of claim 18, wherein the rules comprise one or more of:

a rule relating two or more of the processing cells in a hierarchy, wherein to organize the collected events, the processing cells propagate or aggregate an event collected by processing cells in the hierarchy based on the rule;

a rule relating two or more of the processing cells in a layer, wherein to organize the collected events, the processing cells propagate or aggregate an event collected by processing cells in the layer based on the rule;

a rule relating two or more of the processing cells in the infrastructure according to a business or application transaction associated with the business service, wherein to organize the collected events, the processing cells propagate or aggregate an event collected by processing cells in the business or application transaction based on the rule;

a rule defining a class of event to be handled by a processing cell;

a rule defining how a processing cell aggregates a first collected event with a second collected event at the same processing cell; and

a rule defining an executable action to be performed by a processing cell in response to a collected event.

41. The system of claim 18, wherein to determine the impact, the processing cells calculate a performance or an availability measurement of the components of the infrastructure utilized by the business service based on the organized events.

42. The system of claim 18, wherein at least one of the processing cells is configured to implement a sample transaction associated with the business service, and wherein the processing cells are configured to:

collect events resulting from the sample transaction with one or more of the processing cells from one or more of the detectors;

organize the collected events resulting from the sample transaction with the processing cells by propagating and aggregating the collected events amongst the processing cells using the business objects and the rules associated therewith; and

determine an impact that the organized events resulting from the sample transaction have on the business service.

43. The system of claim 42, wherein to implement the sample transaction, the at least one processing cell is configured with first information of the sample transaction, the at least one processing cell associated with a source location of the sample transaction, the first information being used to implement the sample transaction.

44. The system of claim 42, wherein to implement the sample transaction, one or more of the processing cells are configured with second information of the sample transaction, the one or more processing cells associated with a path for the sample transaction, the second information being used to collect execution information of the sample transaction implemented on the infrastructure.

45. The system of claim 42, wherein to implement the sample transaction, the at least one processing cell executes the sample transaction according to cycles having a frequency.

46. The system of claim 45, wherein to execute the sample transaction, each of the cycles of the sample transaction is identified with a specific identification tag.

47. The system of claim 46, wherein to execute the sample transaction, the at least one processing cell generates an execution confirmation event, the execution confirmation event including a timestamp for the execution of the sample transaction and the specific identification tag.

48. The system of claim 46, wherein to collect events resulting from the sample transaction, the one or more processing cells are configured to:

activate instrumentation functions with input data;

capture execution information related to the sample transaction with the activated instrumentation functions; and

generate execution control events having timestamps and the specific identification tag in response to captured execution information.