Service level management system

• US 8,683,041 B2
• Filed: 12/11/2009
• Issued: 03/25/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 03/06/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Vmware LLC (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: VMware, Inc. (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Wexler, Asaf, Dembak, Yoav
• Primary Examiner(s): Nguyen, Tammy
• Application Number:
  US12/635,770
• Publication Number:
  US 20100094916A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,565 Days
• Field of Search: 709/226, 709/220
• US Class Current: 709/226
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5083 Techniques for rebalancing the load in a distributed system
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1001 for accessing one among a plurality of replicated servers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1008 based on parameters of servers, e.g. available memory or workload monitoring of computer activity G06F11/30
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1029 using data related to the state of servers by a load balancer
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1034 Reaction to server failures by a load balancer

Abstract

A method for controlling and maintaining a level of service of web applications is disclosed. The method includes generating a context for each request sent from a client to a web server and for each reply sent from a web server to a client. Then it is determined whether the context belongs to an identified transaction. Statistics respective of the identified transaction is then gathered. Further, a determination is made whether at least one policy predefined for the identified application is violated. A plurality of corrective actions are performed if at least one policy is determined to be violated.

Claims

1. A method for controlling and maintaining a level of service of web applications, comprising:

generating a context for each request sent from a client to a web server and for each reply sent from a web server to a client;

determining whether the context belongs to an identified transaction;

gathering statistics respective of the identified transaction;

determining whether at least one policy predefined for the identified application is violated, wherein the application is an event-driven software program that is responsive to hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) requests; and

performing a plurality of corrective actions if at least one policy is determined to be violated.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

saving the context in a database if it is determined that the context does not belong to an identified transaction; and

learning new applications using data stored in the database.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the learning of the new applications is performed using at least one of an application definer, and a correlation process.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein learning new applications further comprising:

discovering transactions and modules that construct each of the new applications, wherein each module is a group of the transactions; and

generating a site tree on the basis of the discovered transactions and modules that construct each of the new applications which belong to a designated site.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein the request is at least a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) request.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein generating the context includes parsing the HTTP request.

7. The method of claim 4, wherein determining if the context belongs to an identified transaction, comprising:

matching the context against a classify data structure (CDC) and a plurality of application filters.

8. The method of claim 6, wherein the CDC including:

a list of identified sites, for each site a list of its web applications, and for each web application a list of transactions and modules that construct the web application.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein the gathered statistics include measures on at least one of:

throughput, response time, number of errors, hits per second, and latency.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of gathering statistics further comprising:

producing a plurality of reports based on the gather statistics.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one policy is checked against the gathered statistics.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the at least one policy defines at least one corrective action to be performed.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein a policy is determined for a web server, a web application, a module, and a transaction.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the corrective actions include at least one of:

scheduling requests to reduce response time, shaping traffic to balance the load, and recovery actions on web servers.

15. The method of claim 1 is configured to operate in the line of traffic.

16. A computer program product including a computer-readable, non-transitory medium comprising software instructions operable to enable a computer to perform a method for controlling and maintaining a level of service of web applications, comprising:

generating a context for each request sent from a client to a web server and for each reply sent from a web server to a client;

determining whether the context belongs to an identified web application;

gathering statistics respective of the identified transaction;

determining whether at least one policy predefined for the transaction is violated, wherein the application is an event-driven software program that is responsive to hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) requests; and

performing a plurality of corrective actions if at least one policy is determined to be violated.

17. The computer program product of claim 16, further comprising:

saving the context in a database if it is determined that the context does not belong to an transaction application;

learning new applications using data stored in the database.

18. The computer program product of claim 17, wherein learning of the new applications is performed using at least one of an application definer, and a correlation process.

19. The computer program product of claim 18, wherein learning new applications further comprising:

discovering transactions and modules that construct each of the new applications, wherein each module is a group of the transactions; and

generating a site tree on the basis of the discovered transactions and modules that construct each of the new applications which belong to a designated site.

20. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein the request is at least a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) request.

21. A method for controlling and maintaining a level of service of web applications, comprising:

generating a context for each request sent from a client to a web server and for each reply sent from a web server to a client;

determining whether the context belongs to an identified transaction;

gathering statistics respective of the identified transaction;

determining whether at least one policy predefined for the identified application is violated, wherein the application is an event-driven software program that is responsive to hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) requests; and

performing a plurality of corrective actions if at least one policy is determined to be violated, wherein the corrective actions include at least one of;

scheduling requests to reduce response time, shaping traffic to balance the load, and recovery actions on web servers.