Locating a target computer device in an array

• US 8,856,320 B2
• Filed: 02/16/2011
• Issued: 10/07/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 02/16/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Lenovo International Limited (Lenovo Group Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Pagan, William G., Snyder, Devon D.
• Primary Examiner(s): Nguyen, Hanh N
• Assistant Examiner(s): Kading, Joshua A
• Application Number:
  US13/028,318
• Publication Number:
  US 20120209988A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,329 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 709/224
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/12 Discovery or management of network topologies
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/52 specially adapted for the location of the user terminal

Abstract

A computer program product for locating a target computer device in an array includes computer usable program code for designating a first computer device as a first point of an axis of a reference coordinate system and designating a second computer device as a second point of the axis. The product includes computer usable program code for registering the connection of a first cable from a target computer device to the first computer device and detecting the connection of a second cable from the target computer device to the second computer device, computer usable program code for determining the length of each of the first and second cables, and computer usable program code for determining the location of the target computer device within the reference coordinate system according to the length of the first cable, the length of the second cable, and locations of the first and second computer devices.

Claims

1. A computer program product including computer usable program code embodied on a non-transitory computer readable storage medium for locating a target computer device in an array of computer devices having a plurality of rows and columns, the computer program product including:

computer usable program code for designating a first computer device as a first point of an axis of a reference coordinate system and designating a second computer device as a second point of the axis, wherein the first computer device and the second computer device are at opposite ends of the same row along an edge of the array or at opposite ends of the same column along an edge of the array;

computer usable program code for selecting the first point of the axis in direct response to the connection of a first end of an axis cable to the first computer device;

computer usable program code for selecting the second point of the axis in direct response to the connection of a second end of the axis cable to the second computer device;

computer usable program code for registering the connection of a first cable from a target computer device to the first computer device and detecting the connection of a second cable from the target computer device to the second computer device;

computer usable program code for determining the length of each of the first and second cables; and

computer usable program code for determining the location of the target computer device within the reference coordinate system according to the length of the first cable, the length of the second cable, and the locations of the first and second computer devices.

2. The computer program product of claim 1, further comprising:

computer usable program code for automatically designating the first computer device as the origin in response to detecting the connection of the first end of the axis cable to the first computer device prior to detecting the connection of the second end of the axis cable to the second computer device.

3. The computer program product of claim 2, further comprising:

computer usable program code for automatically determining the length of the axis cable; and

computer usable program code for determining the location of the second computer device according to the length of the axis cable.

4. The computer program product of claim 1, wherein the computer usable program code for determining the location the target computer device with respect to the reference coordinate system comprises:

computer usable program code for identifying a first subset of computer devices in the array that are connected to the first computer device by a cable equal to the length of the first cable;

computer usable program code for identifying a second subset of computer devices in the array that are connected to the second computer device by a cable equal to the length of the second cable; and

computer usable program code for determining the location of the target computer device as the intersection of the first and second subset of computer devices.

5. The computer program product of claim 1, further comprising:

computer usable program code for determining a cable length of any of the cables by transmitting a signal through the cable and measuring a length-dependent behavior of the signal.

6. The computer program product of claim 1, further comprising:

computer usable program code for automatically reading a cable length of each cable from a storage device on the cable in response to connecting one or both ends of the cable to one of the computer devices in the array.