Method for multidimensional visual correlation of systems management data

• US 8,365,078 B2
• Filed: 01/08/2004
• Issued: 01/29/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 01/08/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Childress, Rhonda L., Kumhyr, David Bruce, Pennell, Neil Raymond
• Primary Examiner(s): Pesin, Boris
• Assistant Examiner(s): Hur, Ece
• Application Number:
  US10/753,250
• Publication Number:
  US 20050198259A1
• Time in Patent Office: 3,309 Days
• Field of Search: 715/736, 715/224, 709/224, 731/78.T, 379/165, 707/201
• US Class Current: 715/736
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/324 Display of status information
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3466 Performance evaluation by tracing or monitoring

Abstract

A method, apparatus, and computer program product for monitoring the performance of a system. The mechanism of the present invention provides an interface in the form of a graphical user interface (GUI) to communicate multiple layers of system performance data to an operator. An operator monitors this display of information and uses it to determine how to adjust the system to optimize system performance. This mechanism of the present invention provides immediate feedback to an operator by displaying a trail of metric points, wherein the metric points indicate the status of system performance over a period of time. In this manner, the display mechanism of the present invention immediately conveys to an operator whether the system is operating within predefined margins, the results of performance adjustments made to the system, as well as predictions or trends for the system.

Claims

1. A method for monitoring system performance and communicating detailed system performance data via an enhanced graphical user interface, comprising:

querying a current monitoring configuration;

monitoring system performance using instructions obtained from the current monitoring configuration;

polling system data according to the current monitoring configuration;

displaying the polled system data on a graphical user interface, wherein the graphical user interface comprises a target-type management vector display including regions representing levels of system performance and a metric point within the display identifying the current status of system performance at a particular point in time; and

performing an adjustment to system operations based on a region in which the metric point is located in the target-type management vector display to move system performance towards a target operational state represented by a point where the vertical axis and horizontal axis meet on the management vector display.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining whether the polled system data is reportable;

selecting a report to display the polled system data; and

identifying information in the polled system data to display in the report.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the metric point within the target-type management vector display provides the performance status of a particular area of the system at a particular time.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein multiple metric points are used in the display to identify a trail of system status information determined at fixed periods of time.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the metric trail is used to determine the effect adjustments to system operation have on system performance.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein the distance between consecutive metric points indicates the rate of change of system performance over a fixed period of time.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the target-type management vector display includes a vertical axis and horizontal axis representing user-defined attributes.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the user-defined attributes include transactions over time.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein industry baseline metrics are used to set the attributes.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the target-type management vector display comprises three regions, wherein a first region indicates satisfactory performance, a second region indicates improvement required performance, and a third region indicates unacceptable performance.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the regions are displayed using different colors.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the graphical user interface includes multiple target-type management vector displays, each display representing system performance for a different set of variables.

13. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

updating the target-type management vector display to include a new metric point identifying an updated status of system performance as a result of the adjustment to the system operation.