Transport of customer flexibility changes in a multi-tenant environment

• US 8,392,573 B2
• Filed: 07/30/2010
• Issued: 03/05/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 07/30/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: SAP SE
• Original Assignee: SAP AG (SAP SE)
• Inventors: Lehr, Matthias, Baeuerle, Stefan, Fanghaenel, Karsten, Thimmel, Bernhard, Schlarb, Uwe, Meincke, Olaf, Driesen, Volker, Specht, Juergen
• Primary Examiner(s): WON, MICHAEL YOUNG
• Application Number:
  US12/847,746
• Publication Number:
  US 20120030312A1
• Time in Patent Office: 949 Days
• Field of Search: 709/217, 709/226, 709/232, 709/248
• US Class Current: 709/226
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/958 Organisation or management of web site content, e.g. publishing, maintaining pages or automatic linking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]

Abstract

Transporting of flexibility changes of customer content between tenants in a multi-tenant computing system can be performed by exporting customer content from a first tenant of the multi-tenant computing system, transporting the customer content exported from the first tenant to a second tenant of the multi-tenant computing system, importing the customer content into a staging area in the second tenant to enable a user associated with second tenant to access the customer content via the staging area based on a content extraction trigger, and activating selected customer content from the staging area in a productive component of the second tenant. The content extraction trigger can characterize an extraction of at least some of the customer content from the staging area. Related methods, systems, and articles of manufacture are also disclosed.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

identifying a content move trigger in a multi-tenant computing system, the content move trigger characterizing a transfer of customer content from a first tenant of the multi-tenant computing system to a second tenant of the multi-tenant computing system;

exporting the customer content from the first tenant based on the content move trigger;

transporting the exported customer content from the first tenant to the second tenant;

importing the exported customer content into a staging area in the second tenant to enable a user associated with the second tenant to selectively access the exported customer content via the staging area based on a content extraction trigger, the content extraction trigger characterizing an extraction of selected customer content from the staging area to activate the selected customer content in the second tenant; and

wherein the multi-tenant computing system forms part of a multi-tenant environment using a single software delivery architecture, and includes;

at least one processor implementing an application server accessible over a network from the plurality of clients associated with each of multiple tenants; and

at least one data repository containing;

core software platform content relating to the operation of the multi-tenant computing system which is not modifiable by the multiple tenants;

system content including data objects created in runtime by the multi-tenant computing system that are modifiable with data provided by a corresponding tenant, and

the customer content including data objects or extensions to data objects that are customized for a corresponding tenant.

2. A method as in claim 1, wherein the content extraction trigger is based on a content type.

3. A method as in claim 1, further comprising activating the selected content in the second tenant.

4. A method as in claim 3, further comprising monitoring the activating of the selected content to determine errors in the staging area.

5. A method as in claim 1, wherein the staging area further comprises:

a generic staging area that persists the selected customer content; and

a local staging area that extracts the selected customer content from the generic staging area according to a content type associated with the customer content.

6. A method as in claim 5, further comprising activating the selected content from the local staging area in the second tenant.

7. A computer-implemented method for transporting flexibility changes of customer content between tenants in a multi-tenant computing system, the method comprising:

exporting customer content from a first tenant of the multi-tenant computing system;

transporting the customer content exported from the first tenant to a second tenant of the multi-tenant computing system;

importing the customer content into a staging area in the second tenant to enable a user associated with second tenant to access the customer content via the staging area based on a content extraction trigger, the content extraction trigger characterizing an extraction of at least some of the customer content from the staging area; and

activating selected customer content from the staging area in a productive component of the second tenant.

8. The method in accordance with claim 7, wherein the staging area further comprises:

a generic staging area that persists the selected customer content; and

a local staging area that extracts the selected customer content from the generic staging area according to a content type associated with the customer content.

9. The method in accordance with claim 7, further comprising monitoring activation of the selected customer content in the second tenant.

10. The method in accordance with claim 7, wherein the customer content includes business configuration data of a business configuration workspace.

11. The method in accordance with claim 10, wherein the customer content includes change data associated with the business configuration data.

12. A method as in claim 7, wherein the content extraction trigger is based on a content type.

13. A method as in claim 7, further comprising activating the selected content in the second tenant.

14. A computer program product comprising a non-transitory machine-readable medium storing instructions that, when executed by at least one processor, cause the at least one processor to perform operations comprising:

identifying a content move trigger in a multi-tenant computing system, the content move trigger characterizing a transfer of customer content from a first tenant of the multi-tenant computing system to a second tenant of the multi-tenant computing system;

exporting the customer content from the first tenant based on the content move trigger;

transporting the exported customer content from the first tenant to the second tenant;

importing the exported customer content into a staging area in the second tenant to enable a user associated with the second tenant to selectively access the exported customer content via the staging area based on a content extraction trigger, the content extraction trigger characterizing an extraction of selected customer content from the staging area to activate the selected customer content in the second tenant; and

wherein the multi-tenant computing system forms part of a multi-tenant environment using a single software delivery architecture, and includes;

at least one application server accessible over a network from the plurality of clients associated with each of multiple tenants; and

at least one data repository containing;

core software platform content relating to the operation of the multi-tenant computing system which is not modifiable by the multiple tenants;

system content including data objects created in runtime by the multi-tenant computing system that are modifiable with data provided by a corresponding tenant, and

the customer content including data objects or extensions to data objects that are customized for a corresponding tenant.

15. A computer program product as in claim 14, wherein the content extraction trigger is based on a content type.

16. A computer program product as in claim 14, wherein the operations further comprise activating the selected content in the second tenant.

17. A computer program product as in claim 16, further comprising monitoring the activating of the selected content to determine errors in the staging area.

18. A method as in claim 14, wherein the staging area further comprises:

a generic staging area that persists the selected customer content; and

a local staging area that extracts the selected customer content from the generic staging area according to a content type associated with the customer content.

19. A computer program product as in claim 18, wherein the operations further comprise activating the selected content from the local staging area in the second tenant.

20. A computer program product as in claim 14, further comprising the at least one processor that performs the operations.