Change management system and method

• US 8,738,966 B2
• Filed: 10/19/2011
• Issued: 05/27/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 10/19/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: CA, Inc. (d/b/a CA Technologies) (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: CA, Inc. (d/b/a CA Technologies) (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Hopper, Robin
• Primary Examiner(s): Ehne, Charles
• Application Number:
  US13/276,653
• Publication Number:
  US 20130103990A1
• Time in Patent Office: 951 Days
• Field of Search: 714/25, 714/26
• US Class Current: 714/25
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/079 Root cause analysis, i.e. error or fault diagnosis in a hardware test environment G06F11/22; in a software test environment G06F11/36
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0793 Remedial or corrective actions recovery from an exception in an instruction pipeline G06F9/3861; by retry G06F11/1402; for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity H04L69/40

Abstract

A method is provided for managing changes to a computer system. The method includes generating a database configured with fields identifying one or more component changes and potential problems associated with each one or more component changes; populating the fields of the database with information as a change is made to a computer system; monitoring the computer system for issuance of error alerts; comparing issued error alerts against entries of potential problems in the database; and identifying a set of at least one of the component changes as a potential cause of the issued error alert based on the result of the comparing step. The method executes a corrective process in response to the identification of the potential cause of the issued error and updates the database entry of the set of at least one of the component changes to reflect the issued error as a confirmed error thereof.

Claims

1. A method for managing software updates to a computer system comprising:

generating a database configured with fields identifying a plurality of software updates and potential problems associated with the software updates;

populating the fields of the database with information responsive to a software update being made to the computer system;

monitoring the computer system for issuance of error alerts;

comparing issued error alerts against entries of potential problems in the database;

identifying a set of at least one of the software updates as a potential cause of an issued error alert in response to the comparing; and

rolling back the set of at least one of the software updates that was identified as the potential cause of the error alert, to a previously installed version thereof.

2. The method as in claim 1, further comprising updating the database entry of potential problems associated with each of a minimum number of software updates to reflect the issued error alert as a confirmed error thereof.

3. The method as in claim 1, wherein the identifying comprises iteratively identifying a minimum number of software updates from the set of at least one of the software updates as a confirmed cause of the issued error.

4. The method as in claim 3, wherein the rolling back comprises rolling back one of the set of at least one of the software updates to a previously installed version thereof, and monitoring for a subsequent occurrence of the issued error alert.

5. The method as in claim 4, wherein if the subsequent occurrence of the issued error alert is detected, a next one of the set of at least one of the software updates is rolled back to a previously installed version thereof.

6. The method as in claim 5, wherein the iteratively identifying comprises rolling back each of the set of at least one of the software updates until the subsequent occurrence of the issued error alert ceases, and identifying a last replaced software update of the set of at least one of the software updates as a confirmed cause.

7. The method as in claim 1, further comprising identifying the potential problem corresponding to the issued error alert as a confirmed problem of the set of at least one of the software updates.

8. A computer program comprising:

a tangible computer-readable storage medium comprising computer-readable program code embodied in the medium that when executed by at least one processor of a computer system causes the computer system to perform operations comprising;

generating a database configured with fields identifying a plurality of software updates and potential problems associated with the software updates;

populating the fields of the database with information responsive to a software update being made to a computer system;

monitoring the computer system for issuance of error alerts;

comparing issued error alerts against entries of potential problems in the database;

identifying a set of at least one of the software updates as a potential cause of an issued error alert in response to the comparing; and

rolling back the set of at least one of the software updates that was identified as the potential cause of the error alert, to a previously installed version thereof.

9. The computer program as in claim 8, further comprising updating the database entry of potential problems associated with each of the minimum number of software update to reflect the issued error alert as a confirmed error thereof.

10. The computer program as in claim 8, wherein the identifying comprises iteratively identifying a minimum number of software updates from the set of at least one of the software updates as a confirmed cause of the issued error.

11. The computer program as in claim 10, wherein the rolling back comprises rolling back one of the set of at least one of the software updates to a previously installed version thereof, and monitoring for a subsequent occurrence of the issued error alert.

12. The computer program as in claim 10, wherein if the subsequent occurrence of the issued error alert is detected, a next one of the set of at least one of the software updates is rolled back to a previously installed version thereof.

13. The computer program as in claim 11, wherein the iteratively identifying comprises rolling back each of the set of at least one of the software updates until the subsequent occurrence of the issued error alert ceases, and identifying a last replaced software update of the set of at least one of the software updates as a confirmed cause.

14. The computer program as in claim 8, further comprising identifying the potential problem corresponding to the issued error alerts as a confirmed problem of the set of at least one of the software updates.