Detection of component operating state by computer

• US 9,292,313 B2
• Filed: 09/10/2013
• Issued: 03/22/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 10/10/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Araki, Hiroshi, Hasegawa, Tohru
• Primary Examiner(s): Abad, Farley
• Assistant Examiner(s): YU, HENRY W
• Application Number:
  US14/022,674
• Publication Number:
  US 20140101432A1
• Time in Patent Office: 924 Days
• Field of Search: 710/5, 710 15- 16, 710/19, 710/33, 707/6, 707/758, 707/761, 707/780, 717/143, 717/107, 717/108
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3055 Monitoring arrangements for monitoring the status of the computing system or of the computing system component, e.g. monitoring if the computing system is on, off, available, not available error or fault processing without redundancy G06F11/0703; error detection or correction by redundancy in data representation G06F11/08; error detection or correction by redundancy in operation G06F11/14; error detection or correction by redundancy in hardware G06F11/16
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3072 where the reporting involves data filtering, e.g. pattern matching, time or event triggered, adaptive or policy-based reporting
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3476 Data logging G06F11/14, G06F11/2205 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2201/81 Threshold
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/44505 Configuring for program initiating, e.g. using registry, configuration files

Abstract

A mechanism is provided for detecting an operating state of a component. A CLI command is transmitted via a command line interface to the component. An output character string is received responsive to the CLI command. A set of significant character substrings is dissected from the output character string, where each significant character substring comprises a label character string indicating a meaning of the output character string and a data character string expressing data of the output character string. A regular expression corresponding to each significant character substring is set thereby forming a set of regular expressions. A difference is calculated between each of the set regular expressions and each significant character substring corresponding to the regular expression as a character string distance. Each calculated character string distance is compared to a corresponding predetermined threshold and the operating state of the component is output based on results of the comparison.

Claims

1. A method in a computer system for detecting an operating state of a component in the computer system comprising a plurality of components, the method comprising:

transmitting a command line interface (CLI) command via a command line interface to the component;

receiving an output character string from the component responsive to the CLI command;

dissecting a set of significant character substrings from the output character string, wherein each significant character substring comprises a label character string indicating a meaning of the output character string and a data character string expressing data of the output character string;

setting a regular expression corresponding to each significant character substring of the set of significant character substrings thereby forming a set of regular expressions;

calculating a difference between each regular expression of the set of regular expressions and each significant character substring corresponding to the regular expression as a character string distance thereby forming a set of calculated character string distances;

comparing each calculated character string distance in the set of calculated character string distances to a set of corresponding predetermined thresholds, wherein comparing each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds comprises;

setting a first value i to 1 and a second value S to 0, wherein the first value i identities a particular calculated character string distance in the set of calculated character string distances associated with an i^th significant character substring being analyzed and wherein S identifies a sum of the calculated character string distance times a weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring;

determining whether the first value i is less than or equal to a total number N of the set of significant character substrings;

responsive to the first value i being less than or equal to the total number N, determining whether the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring is greater than or equal to a strict threshold T2;

responsive to the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring being greater than or equal to the strict threshold T2, either logging a result or displaying a warning, and ending the comparison of each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds;

responsive to the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring being less than the strict threshold T2, determining whether the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring is greater than or equal to a loose threshold T1;

responsive to the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring being greater than or equal to the loose threshold T1, either logging a result or displaying a warning, setting the second value S to the second value S plus the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring, increasing the first value i by 1, and repeating the process for the next calculated character string distance;

responsive to the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring being less than the loose threshold T1, setting the second value S to S plus the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring, increasing the first value i by 1, and repeating the process for the next calculated character string distance;

responsive to the first value i being greater than the total number N, determining whether the second value S is greater than or equal to an overall threshold T3;

responsive to the second value S being greater than or equal to the overall threshold T3, either logging a result or displaying a warning, and ending the comparison of each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds; and

responsive to the second value S being less than the overall threshold T3, ending the comparison of each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds; and

outputting the operating state of the component based on results of the comparison.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein each significant character substring further includes a character string for making the output of the output character string easier for a user to view, wherein the character string for making the output of the data character string of the output character string easier for the user to view is at least one of a blank section, a delimiter, or a line break.

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein each regular expression includes the character string distance for utilization by the corresponding significant character substring.

4. The method according to claim 1, wherein calculating the character string distance calculates the character string distance using an Edit Distance.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein outputting the operating state of the component at least performs an action of either saving the operating state to a log of a recording device or displaying art alert by a display device, when the character string distance is larger than the corresponding predetermined threshold.

16. The method according to claim 1, wherein calculating the character string distance is defined as a function with the following properties:

the character string distance is 0 when the significant character substring matches the regular expression, the character string distance is a real number of 0 or higher when the significant character substring fails to match the regular expression, and the character string distance is larger as the significant character substring is more different than the regular expression.

6. A computer program product, for detecting an operating state of a component in a computer system, comprising a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having a computer readable program stored therein, wherein the computer readable program, when executed on a computing device, causes the computing device to:

transmit a command line interface (CLI) command via a command line interface to the component;

receive an output character string from the component responsive to the CLI command;

dissect a set of significant character substrings from the output character string, wherein each significant character substring comprises a label character string indicating a meaning of the output character string and a data character string expressing data of the output character string;

set a regular expression corresponding to each significant character substring of the set of significant character substrings thereby forming a set of regular expressions;

calculate a difference between each regular expression of the set of regular expressions and each significant character substring corresponding to the regular expression as a character string distance thereby forming a set of calculated character string distances;

compare each calculated character string distance in the set of calculated character string distances to a set of corresponding predetermined thresholds, wherein the computer readable program to compare each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds further causes the computing device to;

set a first value i to 1 and a second value S to 0, wherein the first value i identifies a particular calculated character string distance in the set of calculated character string distances associated with an i^th significant character substring being analyzed and wherein S identifies a sum of the calculated character string distance times a weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring;

determine whether the first value is less than or equal to a total number N of the set of significant character substrings;

responsive to the first value i being less than or equal to the total number N, determine whether the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring is greater than or equal to a strict threshold T2;

responsive to the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring being greater than or equal to the strict threshold T2, either log a result or display a warning, and end the comparison of each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds;

responsive to the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring being less than the strict threshold T2, determine whether the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring is greater than or equal to a loose threshold T1;

responsive to the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) of the i^th significant character substring being greater than or equal to the loose threshold T1, either log a result or display a warning, set the second value S to the second value S plus the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring, increase the first value i by 1, and repeat the process for the next calculated character string distance;

responsive to the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring being less than the loose threshold T1, set the second value S to S plus the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring, increase the first value i by 1, and repeat the process for the next calculated character string distance;

responsive to the first value i being greater than the total number N, determine whether the second value S is greater than or equal to an overall threshold T3;

responsive to the second value S being greater than or equal to the overall threshold T3, either log a result or display a warning, and end the comparison of each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds; and

responsive to the second value S being less than the overall threshold T3, end the comparison of each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds; and

output the operating state of the component based on results of the comparison.

7. The computer program product of claim 6, wherein each significant character substring further includes a character string for making the output of the output character string easier for a user to view, wherein the character string for making the output of the data character string of the output character string easier for the user to view is at least one of a blank section, a delimiter, or a line break.

8. The computer program product of claim 6, wherein each regular expression includes the character string distance for utilization by the corresponding significant character substring.

9. The computer program product of claim 6, wherein the computer readable program to calculate the character string distance further causes the computing device to calculate the character string distance using an Edit Distance.

10. The computer program product of claim 6, wherein the computer readable program to output the operating state of the component further causes the computing device to perform at least one of saving the operating state to a log of a recording device or displaying an alert by a display device, when the character string distance is larger than the corresponding predetermined threshold.

17. The computer program product of claim 6, wherein calculating the character string distance is defined as a function with the following properties:

the character string distance is 0 when the significant character substring matches the regular expression, the character string distance is a real number of 0 or higher when the significant character substring fails to match the regular expression, and the character string distance is larger as the significant character substring is more different than the regular expression.

11. A system comprising:

a processor; and

a memory coupled to the processor, wherein the memory comprises instructions which, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to;

transmit a command line interface (CLI) command via a command line interface to the component;

receive an output character string from the component responsive to the CLI command;

dissect a set of significant character substrings from the output character string, wherein each significant character substring comprises a label character string indicating a meaning of the output character string and a data character string expressing data of the output character string;

set a regular expression corresponding to each significant character substring of the set of significant character substrings thereby forming a set of regular expressions;

calculate a difference between each regular expression of the set of regular expressions and each significant character substring corresponding to the regular expression as a character string distance thereby forming a set of calculated character string distances;

compare each calculated character string distance in the set of calculated character string distances to a set of corresponding predetermined thresholds, wherein the instructions to compare each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds further cause the processor to;

set a first value i to 1 and a second value S to 0, wherein the first value i identifies a particular calculated character string distance in the set of calculated character string distances associated with an i^th significant character substring being analyzed and wherein S identifies a sum of the calculated character string distance times a weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring;

determine whether the first value i is less than or equal to a total number N of the set of significant character substrings,

responsive to the first value i being less than or equal to the total number N, determine whether the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring is greater than or equal to a strict threshold T2;

responsive to the calculated character string distance tunes the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring being greater than or equal to the strict threshold T2, either log a result or display a warning, and end the comparison of each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds;

responsive to the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring being less than the strict threshold T2, determine whether the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring is greater than or equal to a loose threshold T1;

responsive to the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring being greater than or equal to the loose threshold T1, either log a result or display a warning, set the second value S to the second value S plus the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring increase the first value i by 1, and repeat the process for the next calculated character string distance;

responsive to the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring being less than the loose threshold T1, set the second value S to S plus the calculated character string distance times the weighting coefficient W(i) for the i^th significant character substring, increase the first value i by 1, and repeat the process for the next calculated character string distance;

responsive to the first value i being greater than the total number N, determine whether the second value S is greater than or equal to an overall threshold T3;

responsive to the second value S being greater than or equal to the overall threshold T3, either log a result or display a warning, and end the comparison of each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds; and

responsive to the second value S being less than the overall threshold T3, end the comparison of each calculated character string distance to the set of corresponding predetermined thresholds; and

output the operating state of the component based on results of the comparison.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein each significant character substring further includes a character string for making the output of the output character string easier for a user to view, wherein the character string for making the output of the data character string of the output character string easier for the user to view is at least one of a blank section, a delimiter, or a line break.

13. The system of claim 11, wherein each regular expression includes the character string distance for utilization by the corresponding significant character substring.

14. The system of claim 11, wherein the instructions to calculate the character string distance further causes the processor to calculate the character string distance using an Edit Distance.

15. The system of claim 11, wherein the instructions to output the operating state of the component further causes the processor to perform at least one of saving the operating state to a log of a recording device or displaying an alert by a display device, when the character string distance is larger than the corresponding predetermined threshold.

18. The system of claim 11, wherein calculating the character string distance is defined as a function with the following properties:

the character string distance is 0 when the significant character substring matches the regular expression, the character string distance is a real number of 0 or higher when the significant character substring fails to match the regular expression, and the character string distance is larger as the significant character substring is more different than the regular expression.