Service and application management in information technology systems

• US 7,930,681 B2
• Filed: 12/30/2005
• Issued: 04/19/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 12/30/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: SAP SE
• Original Assignee: SAP AG (SAP SE)
• Inventors: Erdtmann, Uwe, Krimmel, Stefan, Downham, Lee, Kloeffer, Michael, Mueller, Matthias, Subat, Juergen
• Primary Examiner(s): Puente; Emerson C
• Assistant Examiner(s): Labud; Jonathan R
• Application Number:
  US11/322,946
• Publication Number:
  US 20070168874A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,936 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 717/120
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/65 Updates security arrangements therefor G06F21/57
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling

Abstract

Systems and techniques for managing services and applications of a client system, such as an enterprise computer system, reduce the operational workload and optimize daily support process by deliverying embedded services in client system with direct connection of services into a back-end system so that back-end system processes can analyze client system information and provide detailed reports and analyses and with continuous (or regular) data exchange between client system and backend system to ensure efficient client system software processes. The embedded services can include support, operation, change and deploy, and plan and optimize services. The output of at least one of these services can be pushed to and displayed in a graphical user interface. A fact sheet provided with he graphical user interface contains on one page all the information that is needed to clearly show who is responsible for handling information technology problems, incidents, tasks, and service requests.

Claims

1. A computer implemented method of managing software installed on a client system, the method comprising the following steps performed by one or more processors:

initiating at least two embedded services integrated with the software installed on the client system, wherein the embedded services comprise i) a health check monitoring service to automatically trigger one of a system incident message and an administrative task message in response to a generated event, ii) a support service to handle at least one of a system incident message and a user incident message, iii) a software maintenance service to automatically deploy at least one software update to the software installed on the client system, and iv) a continuous improvement service to implement at least one recommended action to improve an efficiency of the client system;

aggregating information outputted from the initiated embedded services; and

displaying the aggregated information in a graphical user interface;

wherein the health check monitoring service;

selectively recognizes at least one generated event, each generated event being received if the event triggers at least one predetermined logical rule;

determines, for each received event, whether the received event has an associated predefined task;

initiates a generation of a system incident message for each received event not having an associated predefined task; and

initiates a generation of an administrative task for each received event having an associated predefined task;

the support service;

receives an incident message generated by at least one of a client system resource and an end user, the incident message including collected context data characterizing a state of the client system;

assigns the incident message to an appropriate key user based on the context data;

routes the incident message to the appropriate key user; and

initiates an implementation of a solution to the incident message by the appropriate key user;

the software maintenance service;

transmits information describing a change to the software installed on the client system to a back-end system;

receives at least one update recommendation from the back-end system based on the transmitted information;

initiates the automatic downloading of at least one software update associated with the update recommendations in response to a trigger event detected by the client system; and

automatically deploys the software updates; and

the continuous improvement service comprises;

transmits information describing the client system to a back-end system;

receives, from the back-end system, at least one recommended action to improve an efficiency of the client system, the recommended action based on a predefined benchmark; and

implements the at least one received recommended actions.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein each generated event indicates a change in an operational parameter of one of a plurality of components of the client system.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 wherein determining whether the received event has an associated predefined task comprises:

retrieving a plurality of predefined events, each predefined event associated with at least one predefined task needed to resolve the associated predefined event;

determining, for each received event, whether the received event is a predefined event; and

associating, for each received event, the at least one predefined task with the received event that is a predefined event.

4. The computer implemented method of claim 1, wherein initiating a generation of a system incident message for each received event not having an associated predefined task comprises:

automatically collecting context data associated with each received event;

generating, for each received event, an incident report based on the collected context data; and

generating, for each incident report, an incident service request based on the generated incident report.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the support service to handle at least one of a system incident message and a user incident message further comprises:

routing a solution message notifying the end user of a solution to the incident message generated by the end user.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the software maintenance service to automatically deploy at least one software update to the software installed on the client system further comprises automatically preparing the client system for deploying the downloaded software updates.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein automatically preparing the client system for deploying the downloaded software updates comprises:

automatically checking for prerequisite tasks;

providing notification of the prerequisite tasks; and

providing instructions for manually performing the prerequisite tasks.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the at least one recommended action to improve an efficiency of the client system from the back-end system is based on an analysis of the transmitted information, the analysis including an identification of an improved use for at least one client system resource, based on the predefined benchmark.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein displaying the aggregated information in a graphical user interface comprises:

displaying the aggregated information in a work list associated with a user based on a service level agreement.

10. A system for managing software, the system comprising:

a plurality of client computer systems, each client computer system comprising a processor, a display device, a network interface, an input device, and a computer readable medium;

a computer program product stored on the computer readable medium of at least one of the client computer systems, the stored computer program product including executable instructions causing the at least one client computer system to;

initiate at least two embedded services integrated with an enterprise software product stored on the computer readable medium based on a service level agreement, wherein the embedded services comprise i)a health check monitoring service to automatically trigger one of a system incident message and an administrative task message in response to a generated event, ii) a support service to handle at least one of a system incident message and a user incident message, iii) a software maintenance service to automatically deploy at least one software update to the software installed on the client system, and iv) a continuous improvement service to implement at least one recommended action to improve an efficiency of the client system;

aggregate information outputted from the initiated embedded services; and

display the aggregated information in a graphical user interface

wherein the health check monitoring service;

selectively recognizes one or more generated events, each generated event being received if the event triggers at least one predetermined logical rule;

determines, for each received event, whether the received event has an associated predefined task;

initiates a generation of a system incident message for each received event not having an associated predefined task; and

initiates a generation of an administrative task for each received event having an associated predefined task;

the support service comprises;

receives an incident message generated by at least one of a client system resource and an end user, the incident message including collected context data characterizing a state of the client system;

assigns the incident message to an appropriate key user based on the context data;

routes the incident message to the appropriate key user; and

initiates an implementation of a solution to the incident message by the appropriate key user;

the software maintenance service comprises;

transmits information describing a change to the software installed on the client system to a back-end system;

receiving at least on update recommendation from the back-end system based on the transmitted information;

initiates the automatic downloading of at least one software update associated with the update recommendations in response to a trigger event detected by the client system; and

automatically deploys the software updates; and

the continuous improvement service comprises;

transmits information describing the client system to a back-end system;

receives, from the back-end system, at least one recommended action to improve an efficiency of the client system, the recommended action based on a predefined benchmark; and

implements at least one received recommended action.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein each generated event indicates a change in an operational parameter of one of a plurality of components of one of the plurality of client computer systems.

12. The system of claim 10, wherein the executable instructions causing the at least one client computer system to determine, for each received event, whether the received event has an associated predefined task comprises executable instructions that cause the at least one client computer system to:

retrieve a plurality of predefined events, each predefined event associated with at least one predefined task needed to resolve the associated predefined event;

determine, for each received event, whether the received event is a predefined event; and

associate, for each received event, the at least one predefined task with the received event that is a predefined event.

13. The system of claim 10, wherein the executable instructions causing the at least one client computer system to initiate a generation of a system incident message for each received event not having an associated predefined task comprises executable instructions that cause the at least one client computer system to:

automatically collect context data associated with each received event;

generate, for each received event, an incident report based on the collected context data; and

generate, for each incident report, an incident service request based on the generated incident report.

14. The system of claim 10, wherein the at least one recommended action to improve an efficiency of the client systems from the back-end system is based on an analysis of the transmitted information, the analysis including an identification of an improved use for at least one client system resource, based on the predefined benchmark.

15. The system of claim 10, wherein the executable instructions causing the at least one client computer system to display the aggregated information in a graphical user interface comprises executable instructions that cause the at least one client computer system to:

associate the aggregated information with at least one view of a graphical user interface associated with a user; and

display the aggregated information in a selected one of the at least one views of the graphical user interface.

16. The system of claim 10, wherein the executable instructions causing the at least one client computer system to display the aggregated information in a graphical user interface comprises executable instructions that cause the at least one client computer system to:

display the aggregated information in a work list associated with a user based on the service level agreement.

17. A computer-implemented method of managing software installed on a client system, the method steps performed by at least one processor and comprising:

providing back-end server support for an embedded health check monitoring service integrated with the software, comprising;

receiving, from the client system, at least one event incident message generated by the embedded health check monitoring service, the event incident message generated in response to an event detected by the client system and a determination, by the client system, that the detected event has an associated predefined task, the event incident message including context data collected by the client system, the context data relating to the detected event; and

generating, and storing in memory, a service request relating to the received event incident message, the stored service request accessible to an administrator for the client system;

providing back-end server support for an embedded support service integrated with the software, comprising;

receiving, from the client system, at least one system incident message generated by the embedded support service, the system incident message generated in response to a message reporting an incident received at the support service, the system incident message including context data collected from the client system in connection with the incident, the context data characterizing a state of the client system;

processing the incident message to determine a resolution for the incident message, based at least in part on the context data; and

transmitting a resolution message to the client system including at least one task, to be performed by the client system, in implementing the determined resolution;

providing back-end server support for an embedded software maintenance service integrated with the software, comprising;

receiving, from the client system, an update status message generated by an embedded software maintenance service, the update status message including data describing a change to the software installed on the client system;

determining at least one update recommendation in response to and based at least in part on the update status message, the update recommendation associated with at least one software update available for download by the client system in response to a trigger event detected by the client system; and

transmitting the at least one update recommendation to the client system;

providing back-end server support for an embedded continuous improvement service integrated with the software, comprising;

receiving, from the client system, at least one efficiency improvement message generated by an embedded continuous improvement service integrated with the software, the efficiency improvement message including information describing the client system and at least one client system resource;

analyzing the information describing the client system to identify at least one improved use of the at least one client system resource based on a predefined benchmark;

determining, based at least in part on the identification of the improved use for the system resource, at least one recommended action to improve an efficiency of the client system when implemented by the client system; and

transmitting the at least one recommended action to the client system.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein each method step is performed by at least one of a plurality of processors within a distributed computing environment.

19. The method of claim 17, wherein the event incident message indicates a change in an operational parameter of one of a plurality of components of the client system.

20. The method of claim 17, wherein communications received from and transmitted to the client system are communicated through a channel dedicated for communication with the client system.