Integrated fingerprinting in configuration audit and management

• US 8,051,298 B1
• Filed: 11/29/2005
• Issued: 11/01/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 11/29/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: T-Mobile Innovations LLC (Deutsche Telekom AG)
• Original Assignee: Sprint Communications Company LP (Deutsche Telekom AG)
• Inventors: Taylor, Michael J., Felton, John D., Burr, Jonathon A.
• Primary Examiner(s): Shiferaw; Eleni
• Assistant Examiner(s): PHAM, LUU T
• Application Number:
  US11/288,705
• Time in Patent Office: 2,163 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 713/187
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/302 where the computing system component is a software system
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3051 Monitoring arrangements for monitoring the configuration of the computing system or of the computing system component, e.g. monitoring the presence of processing resources, peripherals, I/O links, software programs verification or detection of system hardware configuration G06F11/2247

Abstract

A system and computer implemented method for identifying active applications in an enterprise computing system is provided. The method includes defining a plurality of fingerprints for an application. A first fingerprint is related to a directory structure associated with the application. A second fingerprint is related to checking memory of at least some of the enterprise computing systems for data related to the application. The method includes searching the enterprise computing system for at least one fingerprint. The method includes when a fingerprint is found, identifying the application associated with the fingerprint as active.

Claims

1. A computer implemented method for identifying whether applications are active in a computing system of an enterprise, the method comprising:

defining and storing, by a computer device, a first plurality of fingerprints associated with a plurality of internal applications, wherein each of the first plurality of fingerprints comprises an identification code, a version number, and a build number, and wherein the plurality of internal applications are created by development staff within the enterprise;

defining and storing, by the computer device, a second plurality of fingerprints associated with a plurality of third party applications, wherein the second plurality of fingerprints comprise directory structures, files associated with the plurality of third party applications, times of last modification of one or more data stores associated with the plurality of third party applications, and types of modification of data in one or more data stores associated with the plurality of third party applications;

determining whether applications are internal applications or third party applications;

in response to determining that the applications are internal applications, searching, by the computer device, the computing system for fingerprints of the first plurality of fingerprints associated with the applications;

identifying the applications as active when the fingerprints of the first plurality of fingerprints are found;

in response to determining that the applications are third party applications, searching, by the computer device, the computing system for fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints associated with the applications, wherein the searching for the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints comprises;

searching a plurality of directory structures of the computing system for the directory structures in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints;

searching a plurality of files of the computing system for the files associated with the applications in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints;

searching memory of the computing system for the data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints in a predefined threshold number of searches, wherein the predefined threshold number of searches is greater than one;

searching one or more data stores of the computing system associated with the applications for the times of last modification in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints; and

searching one or more data stores of the computing system associated with the applications for the types of modification of data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints; and

identifying the applications as active when a plurality of;

one or more of the directory structures in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found, one or more of the files in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found, one or more of the data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found in one of the predefined threshold number of searches, one or more of the times of last modification in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found, and one or more of the types of modification of data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found.

2. The computer implemented method of claim 1, wherein the files associated with the plurality of third party applications in the second plurality of fingerprints comprise one or more of executable files, DLL files, COM files, binary files, and hash files.

3. The computer implemented method of claim 2, wherein each the directory structures in the second plurality of fingerprints is further defined as a certain hierarchy of file folders.

4. The computer implemented method of claim 1, wherein any one of the searching that comprises the searching for the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is dependent upon another searching that comprises searching for fingerprints within the second plurality of fingerprints.

5. The computer implemented method of claim 1, wherein searching the computing system for a first of the second plurality of fingerprints associated with a first of the plurality of third party applications comprises:

searching a plurality of files of the computing system for one or more files in the first of the second plurality of fingerprints; and

in response to finding the one or more files in the first of the second plurality of fingerprints, searching a plurality of directory structures of the computing system for a directory structure in the first of the second plurality of fingerprint.

6. The computer implemented method of claim 5, further comprising:

in response to finding the directory structure in the first of the second plurality of fingerprints, searching memory of the computing system for data in the first of the second plurality of fingerprints in the predefined threshold number of searches.

7. The computer implemented method of claim 1, wherein the searching the computing system for the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints occurs at different times each day.

8. The computer implemented method of claim 1, wherein the searching the computing system for the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints occurs at different times on different days.

9. The computer implemented method of claim 1, further comprising determining versions of the plurality of third party applications based on the second plurality of fingerprints.

10. A computer system for identifying whether applications are active in a computing system of an enterprise, the system comprising:

at least one processor; and

a memory storing computer executable instructions that, when executed, cause the at least one processor to;

define and store a first plurality of fingerprints associated with a plurality of internal applications, wherein each of the first plurality of fingerprints comprises an identification code, a version number, and a build number, and wherein the plurality of internal applications are created by development staff within the enterprise;

define and store a second plurality of fingerprints associated with a plurality of third party applications, wherein the second plurality of fingerprints comprise directory structures, files associated with the plurality of third party applications, times of last modification of one or more data stores associated with the plurality of third party applications, and types of modification of data in one or more data stores associated with the plurality of third party applications;

determine whether applications are internal applications or third party applications;

in response to determining that the applications are internal applications, search the computing system for fingerprints of the first plurality of fingerprints associated with the applications;

identify the applications as active when the fingerprints of the first plurality of fingerprints are found;

in response to determining that the applications are third party applications, search the computing system for fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints associated with the applications, wherein the search for the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints further configures the at least one processor to;

search a plurality of directory structures of the computing system for the directory structures in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints;

search a plurality of files of the computing system for the files associated with the applications in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints;

search memory of the computing system for the data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints in a predefined threshold number of searches, wherein the predefined threshold number of searches is greater than one;

search one or more data stores of the computing system associated with the applications for the times of last modification in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints; and

search one or more data stores of the computing system associated with the applications for the types of modification of data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints, and

identify the applications as active when a plurality of;

one or more of the directory structures in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found, one or more of the files in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found, one or more of the data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found in one of the predefined threshold number of searches, one or more of the times of last modification in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found, and one or more of the types of modification of data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found.

11. The computer system of claim 10, further comprising HP Service Desk, wherein HP Service Desk is used as an additional tool for identifying applications in the computing system.

12. The computer system of claim 10, further comprising an enterprise development process, wherein the enterprise development process is an additional tool for identifying applications in the computing system.

13. The computer system of claim 10, wherein the system for identifying applications in the computing system is a component in a system for end-to-end configuration management in the computing system.

14. The computer method of claim 10, wherein the files associated with the plurality of third party applications in the second plurality of fingerprints comprise one or more of executable files, DLL files, COM files, binary files, and hash files.

15. The computer system of claim 10, wherein each of the directory structures in the second plurality of fingerprints is further defined as a certain hierarchy of file folders.

16. The computer system of claim 10, wherein each of the first plurality of fingerprints further comprises a dependency between applications.

17. The computer system of claim 16, wherein the dependency between applications comprises at least one of a dependency of one of the plurality of internal applications on another application and a dependency of another application on one of the plurality of internal applications.

18. A non-transitory computer readable medium including program instructions for identifying whether applications are active in a computing system of an enterprise, the program instructions, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to:

define and store a first plurality of fingerprints associated with a plurality of internal applications, wherein each of the first plurality of fingerprints comprises an identification code, a version number, and a build number, and wherein the plurality of internal applications are created by development staff within the enterprise;

define and store a second plurality of fingerprints associated with a plurality of third party applications, wherein the second plurality of fingerprints comprise directory structures, files associated with the plurality of third party applications, times of last modification of one or more data stores associated with the plurality of third party applications, and types of modification of data in one or more data stores associated with the plurality of third party applications;

determine whether applications are internal applications or third party applications;

in response to determining that the applications are internal applications, search the computing system for fingerprints of the first plurality of fingerprints associated with the applications;

identify the applications as active when the fingerprints of the first plurality of fingerprints are found;

in response to determining that the applications are third party applications, search the computing system for fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints associated with the applications, wherein the search for the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints further causes the processor to;

search a plurality of directory structures of the computing system for the directory structures in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints;

search a plurality of files of the computing system for the files associated with the applications in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints;

search memory of the computing system for the data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints in a predefined threshold number of searches, wherein the predefined threshold number of searches is greater than one;

search one or more data stores of the computing system associated with the applications for the times of last modification in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints; and

search one or more data stores of the computing system associated with the applications for the types of modification of data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints, and

identify the applications as active when a plurality of;

one or more of the directory structures in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found, one or more of the files in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found, one or more of the data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found in one of the predefined threshold number of searches, one or more of the times of last modification in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found, and one or more of the types of modification of data in the fingerprints of the second plurality of fingerprints is found.

19. The computer program product of claim 18, wherein the files associated with the plurality of third party applications in the second plurality of fingerprints comprise one or more of executable files, DLL files, COM files, binary files, and hash files.

20. The computer program product of claim 18, wherein each the directory structures in the second plurality of fingerprints is further defined as a certain hierarchy of file folders.