System and method for managing group policy backup

• US 8,429,445 B1
• Filed: 05/23/2011
• Issued: 04/23/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 08/08/2006
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Open Invention Network LLC
• Original Assignee: Open Invention Network LLC
• Inventors: Feeser, Colin Lee, Marks, Ryan Sean
• Primary Examiner(s): GUYTON, PHILIP A
• Application Number:
  US13/113,195
• Time in Patent Office: 701 Days
• Field of Search: 714/4, 714/15, 714/4.1, 709/223, 707/9, 719/316
• US Class Current: 714/4.1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1435 using file system or storage system metadata
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1451 by selection of backup contents
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1464 for networked environments
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1469 Backup restoration techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1471 involving logging of persistent data for recovery
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0619 in relation to data integrity, e.g. data losses, bit errors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/065 Replication mechanisms
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/067 Distributed or networked storage systems, e.g. storage area networks [SAN], network attached storage [NAS]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/20 for managing network security; network security policies in general filtering policies H04L63/0227
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/3242 involving keyed hash functions, e.g. message authentication codes [MACs], CBC-MAC or HMAC
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/3247 involving digital signatures

Abstract

A method, system and program product for group policy backup management in a network having a plurality of domains including components and modules for steps of retrieving a list of group policy objects for a domain, generating a configuration initialization file including a domains section identifying a plurality of domains that are to be backed up and a setup section specifying a plurality of values that control the backup of each policy object in each domain, determining a digital signature for each policy object on a list of policies for the domain, comparing the digital signature for each policy object with a corresponding previous digital signature for each policy, determining if a current digital signature for each policy object matches the corresponding previous digital signature for a policy, and backing up a policy object having a current digital signature that does not match the corresponding previous digital signature.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

retrieving a list of group policy objects for at least one domain;

generating a configuration initialization file including a domains section identifying a plurality of domains that are to be backed up and a setup section specifying a plurality of values that control the backup of each policy object in the at least one domain;

determining a digital signature for each policy object on a list of policies for the domain and comparing the digital signature for each policy object with a corresponding previous digital signature for each policy.

2. The method of claim 1, comprising storing each policy object that does not have a corresponding previous digital signature.

3. The method of claim 1, comprising backing up each policy object for the digital signature that does not match the corresponding previous digital signature.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein determining a digital signature for each policy object is performed by running a hash function on each policy.

5. The method of claim 1, comprising generating a report containing the changes found in each group policy object that has been modified.

6. The method of claim 1, comprising generating a difference report for the domain after each successful policy backup, the difference report including both a current report and a backed up report for each policy object in the domain.

7. The method of claim 1, comprising generating a log file of the backup of each policy object.

8. The method of claim 1, comprising selecting a time and frequency for running a backup of each policy object.

9. The method of claim 1, comprising creating a globally unique identifier for each policy object.

10. The method of claim 9, comprising accumulating backups for each policy object in a folder identified by the corresponding globally unique identifier.

11. A system, comprising:

a computer comprising a group policy backup component, that automatically backs up each modified policy in at least one domain, wherein the group policy backup component;

retrieves a list of group policy objects for a domain;

generates a configuration initialization file including a domains section identifying a plurality of domains that are to be backed up and a setup section specifying a plurality of values that control the backup of each policy object in the at least one domain;

determines a digital signature for each policy object on the list of policies for the domain; and

compares the digital signature for each policy object with a corresponding previous digital signature for each policy.

12. The system of claim 11, comprising a group policy backup manager component that operates on the computer and cooperates with the group policy backup component that backs up and restores individual policies in a domain.

13. The system of claim 11, wherein the group policy backup component backs up each policy object whose digital signature does not match the corresponding previous digital signature.

14. The system of claim 11, wherein the group policy backup component performs a hash function on each policy.

15. The system claim 11, wherein the group policy backup component generates a report containing the changes found in each group policy that has been modified.

16. A non-transitory computer program product comprising a computer readable medium having computer readable code embedded therein, the computer readable medium comprising:

program instructions that retrieve a list of group policy objects for a domain;

program instructions that generate a configuration initialization file including a domains section identifying a plurality of domains that are to be backed up and a setup section specifying a plurality of values that control the backup of each policy object in each domain;

program instructions that determine a digital signature for each policy object on a list of policies for the domain; and

program instructions that compare the digital signature for each policy object with a corresponding previous digital signature for each policy.

17. The computer program product of claim 16, comprising program instructions that backup each policy object with a digital signature that does not match the corresponding previous digital signature and receive a user request that an individual policy should be backed up.

18. The computer program product of claim 16, comprising program instructions that receive a user request that an individual policy should be restored from a previous backup of the individual policy.

19. The computer program product of claim 16, wherein the list of policy objects in a selected domain is displayed by policy name.

20. The computer program product of claim 16, wherein the list of policy objects in a selected domain is displayed by a globally unique identifier for each policy in the list.