Application quality of service envelope

• US 8,417,814 B1
• Filed: 09/22/2004
• Issued: 04/09/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 09/22/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Veritas Technologies, LLC (Whitehouse Group Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Symantec Corporation (NortonLifeLock Inc.)
• Inventors: Hartmann, Alfred C.
• Primary Examiner(s): Bengzon, Greg C
• Application Number:
  US10/948,811
• Time in Patent Office: 3,121 Days
• Field of Search: 709/224, 709/238, 702/182, 370/230.1, 370/385.53
• US Class Current: 709/225
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/504 Resource capping
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/508 Monitor
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5011 the resources being hardware resources other than CPUs, Servers and Terminals
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

A managed node executes one or more applications. The applications utilize the resources of the node. A quality-of-service (QoS) agent on the managed node enforces a QoS policy for the node. The QoS agent characterizes an application'"'"'s usage of the node'"'"'s resources and predicts its future usage. The QoS agent analyzes the predicted resource usage in view of the QoS policy and generates a QoS envelope for the application. The QoS envelope specifies a ceiling on the level of resources that can be used by the application. The QoS agent queues and meters usage above the ceiling specified by the QoS envelope. A security module determines variations between predicted and actual resource usage and generates security events if warranted.

Claims

1. A method of managing resources of a computer adapted to execute a plurality of applications, comprising:

establishing a quality-of-service (QoS) policy for the computer, the QoS policy expressing relative priorities of the plurality of applications;

characterizing the applications'"'"' usages of computer resources;

predicting, responsive to the characterization, the applications'"'"' future usages of the computer resources;

responsive to the QoS policy and the predictions, establishing QoS envelopes for the applications, the QoS envelopes establishing an upper limit on resource usages by the applications;

analyzing an application'"'"'s actual usage of computer resources and the application'"'"'s predicted usage of computer resources; and

generating a security event responsive to a difference between the application'"'"'s actual usage and the application'"'"'s predicted usage.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the computer resources include at least one of the group consisting of:

network resources, platform resources, and storage resources.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein characterizing the applications'"'"' usage of computer resources comprises:

determining historical usage patterns of the applications'"'"' usages of the computer resources.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein predicting the applications'"'"' future usages of the computer resources comprises:

predicting future resource demands by the applications for a future time interval.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

adaptively changing a QoS envelope for an application responsive to new characterizations, predictions, and/or policies.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein a QoS envelope is associated with a particular application and wherein the QoS envelope specifies an upper limit on the application'"'"'s usage of a particular resource of the computer.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein a QoS envelope is associated with an application, and further comprising:

responsive to the application requesting to utilize a resource in excess of the upper limit specified by the associated QoS envelope, queuing the request.

26. The method of claim 1, wherein predicting the applications'"'"' future usages of the computer resources further comprises:

predicting the applications'"'"' future usage of the computer resources responsive to prior application request for computer resources that exceeded prior QoS envelopes for the application.

8. A system for managing resources of a computer, comprising:

a processor for executing computer program modules; and

a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing executable computer program modules comprising;

a characterization module for characterizing an application'"'"'s usage of the computer resources;

a prediction module for predicting the application'"'"'s future usage of the computer resources responsive to the characterization from the characterization module;

a control module for adaptively generating a quality-of-service (QoS) envelope for the application responsive to the application'"'"'s predicted usage of the computer resources; and

a security module for analyzing the application'"'"'s characterized usage of resources and the application'"'"'s predicted usage of resources and generating a security event responsive thereto.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the computer is adapted to execute a plurality of applications, further comprising:

a policy module having a QoS policy expressing relative priorities of the plurality of applications;

wherein the control module generates the QoS envelope for the application responsive to the application'"'"'s predicted usage of the computer resources and the QoS policy.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the control module is adapted to adaptively change the QoS envelope responsive to new characterizations, predictions, and/or QoS policies.

11. The system of claim 8, wherein the QoS envelope specifies an upper limit on the application'"'"'s usage of a computer resource.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the control module is adapted to queue requests by the application for the computer resource in excess of the upper limit specified by the QoS envelope.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the control module is further adapted to meter queued requests to access the resource responsive to a QoS policy and/or availability of the resource.

14. The system of claim 8, further comprising:

an instrumentation module for measuring an application'"'"'s usage of computer resources;

wherein the characterization module utilizes the measurements of the instrumentation module to characterize the application.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the instrumentation module comprises at least one module from the set consisting of:

a network instrumentation module for measuring the application'"'"'s use of network resources;

a platform instrumentation module for measuring the application'"'"'s use of processor and/or memory resources; and

a storage instrumentation module for measuring the application'"'"'s use of storage resources.

16. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having executable computer program instructions recorded thereon for managing resources of a computer, the computer program instruction comprising:

a characterization module for characterizing an application'"'"'s usage of the computer resources;

a prediction module for predicting the application'"'"'s future usage of the computer resources responsive to the characterization from the characterization module;

a control module for adaptively generating a quality-of-service (QoS) envelope for the application responsive to the application'"'"'s predicted usage of the computer resources; and

a security module for analyzing the application'"'"'s characterized usage of resources and the application'"'"'s predicted usage of resources and generating a security event responsive thereto.

17. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 16, wherein the computer is adapted to execute a plurality of applications, further comprising:

a policy module having a QoS policy expressing relative priorities of the plurality of applications;

wherein the control module generates the QoS envelope for the application responsive to the application'"'"'s predicted usage of the computer resources and the QoS policy.

18. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the control module is adapted to adaptively change the QoS envelope responsive to new characterizations, predictions, and/or QoS policies.

19. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 16, wherein the QoS envelope specifies an upper limit on the application'"'"'s usage of a computer resource.

20. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the control module is adapted to queue requests by the application for the computer resource in excess of the upper limit specified by the QoS envelope.

21. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 20, wherein the control module is further adapted to meter queued requests to access the resource responsive to a QoS policy and/or availability of the resource.

22. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 16, further comprising:

an instrumentation module for measuring an application'"'"'s usage of computer resources;

wherein the characterization module utilizes the measurements of the instrumentation module to characterize the application.

23. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 22, wherein the instrumentation module comprises at least one module from the set consisting of:

a network instrumentation module for measuring the application'"'"'s use of networking resources;

a platform instrumentation module for measuring the application'"'"'s use of processor and/or memory resources; and

a storage instrumentation module for measuring the application'"'"'s use of storage resources.

24. A computer system for managing a plurality of nodes on a computer network, comprising:

a processor for executing computer program modules; and

a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing executable computer program modules comprising;

a quality-of-service (QoS) policy repository module for storing a plurality of QoS policies, the QoS policies expressing relative priorities of applications executing on the plurality of nodes; and

a QoS manager module for providing selected QoS policies in the QoS policy repository module to select ones of the plurality of nodes, wherein the QoS manager module is adapted to receive security alerts from the plurality of nodes;

wherein a node receiving a QoS policy from the QoS manager module predicts usage of the node'"'"'s resources by an application executing on the node and, responsive to the predicted usage and the QoS policy, adaptively generates a QoS envelope for the application.

25. The computer system of claim 24, wherein the QoS manager module is further adapted to correlate the security alerts from the plurality of nodes to determine the magnitude of a security event and/or response thereto.