On-demand mailbox synchronization and migration system

• US 9,729,488 B2
• Filed: 12/10/2014
• Issued: 08/08/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 04/26/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: BitTitan Incorporated (Idera, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: BitTitan Incorporated (Idera, Inc.)
• Inventors: Yip, Geeman, Pouzin, Dominic Justin
• Primary Examiner(s): Hussain, Tauqir
• Application Number:
  US14/566,473
• Publication Number:
  US 20150100655A1
• Time in Patent Office: 972 Days
• Field of Search: 709206
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/214 Database migration support
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/27 Replication, distribution or synchronisation of data between databases or within a distributed database system; Distributed database system architectures therefor
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5011 the resources being hardware resources other than CPUs, Servers and Terminals
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/42 Mailbox-related aspects, e.g. synchronisation of mailboxes
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/48 Message addressing, e.g. address format or anonymous messages, aliases
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/025 for remote control or remote monitoring of applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1095 Replication or mirroring of data, e.g. scheduling or transport for data synchronisation between network nodes

Abstract

A system for managing physical and logical resources to provide on-demand synchronization or migration of mailboxes and their corresponding content. Physical resources are managed by automatically assigning mailbox processing tasks to either reserved computing resources, or computing resources dynamically obtained from cloud computing services. Authentication resources are managed by automatically requesting credentials from users, accepting submitted credentials, and initiating mailbox processing tasks.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

receiving, with a migration system, configuration information about a source and a destination electronic messaging system, including identification of a plurality of mailboxes associated with the source electronic messaging system;

migrating mailbox content associated with the plurality of mailboxes from the source to the destination electronic messaging system, wherein said migrating includes dynamically allocating computing resources including a plurality of instances to provide sufficient processing capacity for migration of the mailbox content associated with the plurality of mailboxes from the source electronic messaging system to the destination electronic messaging system, wherein the plurality of instances comprise one or more reserved instances or one or more on-demand instances, the on-demand instances obtained from one or more cloud service providers;

determining a workload associated with each of the instances;

assigning each task of a plurality of tasks involved in said migrating to an instance of the plurality of instances based on the determined workload associated with each of the plurality of instances; and

providing status information regarding the migrating.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising prioritizing the computing resources assigned based on at least one of cost, geographic location, bandwidth, availability, security, type, or speed.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the configuration information includes a messaging protocol employed by the source electronic messaging system, the destination electronic messaging system, or both.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving at least one of administrative credentials for accessing each mailbox of the plurality of mailboxes, user credentials for accessing a mailbox of the plurality of mailboxes, or a combination thereof.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

prompting one or more users for the user credentials.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein assigning each task of a plurality of tasks to an instance of the plurality of instances based on the determined workload associated with each of the plurality of instances is further

based on a workload to capacity ratio of each instance of the plurality of instances.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the plurality of instances includes one or more on-demand instances obtained from one or more cloud service providers and one or more reserved instances.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein migrating mailbox content associated with the plurality of mailboxes from the source electronic messaging system to the destination electronic messaging system includes migrating at least one of an e-mail, a task, a contact, an instant message, a text, a chat, a calendar, a folder, or a document.

29. The method of claim 1, wherein assigning each task of a plurality of tasks involved in said migrating to an instance of the plurality of instances based on the determined workload associated with each of the plurality of instances further comprises:

prioritizing assigning tasks to reserved instances whose current workload is less than their respective capacity.

31. The method of claim 1, further comprising reassigning a task from an on-demand instance to a reserved instances responsive to determining that the reserved instance became available.

35. The method of claim 1, further comprising responsive to determining that an expected processing capacity of an instance is less than or equal to an insufficient processing capacity of the instance, requesting allocation of new on-demand instances using a cloud service API of one of at least one of the one or more cloud service providers.

9. An apparatus, comprising:

a memory component; and

a processing component that is arranged to operate on data to enable actions, the actions comprising;

receiving, with a migration system, configuration information about a source and a destination electronic messaging system, including identification of a plurality of mailboxes associated with the source electronic messaging system;

migrating mailbox content associated with the plurality of mailboxes from the source to the destination electronic messaging system, wherein said migrating includes dynamically allocating computing resources including a plurality of instances to provide sufficient processing capacity for migration of the mailbox content associated with the plurality of mailboxes from the source electronic messaging system to the destination electronic messaging system, wherein the plurality of instances comprise one or more reserved instances or one or more on-demand instances;

the on-demand instances obtained from one or more cloud service providers;

determining a workload associated with each of the instances;

assigning each task of a plurality of tasks involved in said migrating to an instance of the plurality of instances based on the determined workload associated with each of the plurality of instances; and

providing status information regarding the migrating.

10. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the actions further comprise prioritizing the computing resources assigned based on at least one of cost, geographic location, bandwidth, availability, security, type, or speed.

11. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the configuration information includes a messaging protocol employed by the source electronic messaging system, the destination electronic messaging system, or both.

12. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein dynamically allocating computing resources including a plurality of instances to provide sufficient processing capacity for migration of the mailbox content associated with the plurality of mailboxes from the source electronic messaging system to the destination electronic messaging system comprises:

dynamically allocating computing resources responsive to determining that the computing resources have insufficient processing capacity to execute each task of the plurality of tasks.

13. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein assigning each task of a plurality of tasks to an instance of the plurality of instances based on the determined workload associated with each of the plurality of instances is further

based on a workload to capacity ratio of each instance of the plurality of instances.

14. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein dynamically allocating computing resources including a plurality of instances to provide sufficient processing capacity for migration of the mailbox content associated with the plurality of mailboxes from the source messaging system to the destination messaging system comprises:

determining the size of each mailbox of the plurality of mailboxes; and

determining the sufficient processing capacity based on the size of each mailbox of the plurality of mailboxes.

15. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein each mailbox of the plurality of mailboxes are mailboxes of a first type and wherein at least one task of the plurality of tasks includes translating a mailbox of the plurality of mailboxes to a mailbox of a second type.

16. The method of claim 9, wherein migrating mailbox content associated with the plurality of mailboxes from the source to the destination electronic messaging system includes migrating at least one of an e-mail, a task, a contact, an instant message, a text, a chat, a calendar, a folder, or a document.

30. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein assigning each task of a plurality of tasks involved in said migrating to an instance of the plurality of instances based on the determined workload associated with each of the plurality of instances further comprises:

prioritizing assigning tasks to reserved instances whose current workload is less than their respective capacity.

32. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the actions further comprise reassigning a task from an on-demand instance to a reserved instances responsive to determining that the reserved instance became available.

36. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the actions further comprise responsive to determining that an expected processing capacity of an instance is less than or equal to an insufficient processing capacity of the instance, requesting allocation of new on-demand instances using a cloud service API of one of at least one of the one or more cloud service providers.

17. A method comprising:

enumerating a plurality of instances, each of the plurality of instances configured to execute one or more computing tasks associated with migration of mailbox content from a source electronic messaging system to a destination electronic messaging system, wherein the plurality of instances comprise one or more reserved instances or one or more on-demand instances, the on-demand instances obtained from one or more cloud service providers;

terminating a first instance of the plurality of instances;

determining a workload of each instance of the instances;

assigning a task of the one or more computing tasks to a second instance of the plurality of instances based on the determined workload; and

requesting new instances.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein enumerating a plurality of instances comprises:

enumerating the plurality of instances and states of the plurality of instances;

identifying unfilled instances of the plurality of instances;

identifying pending instances of the plurality of instances; and

identifying registered and unregistered instances of the plurality of instances.

19. The method of claim 17, wherein terminating a first instance of the plurality of instances comprises:

identifying instances of the plurality of instances that are unfulfilled for a time period exceeding a first threshold;

identifying instances of the plurality of instances that are pending for a time period exceeding a second threshold; and

identifying instances of the plurality of instances that have no assigned task.

20. The method of claim 17, wherein assigning a task of the one or more computing tasks to a second instance of the plurality of instances based on the determined workload comprises:

assigning the task to the second instance responsive to determining that the current workload of the second instance is less than the capacity of the second instance.

21. The method of claim 17, wherein requesting new instances comprises:

determining whether an insufficient processing capacity exceeds an expected processing capacity;

if the insufficient processing capacity is greater than the insufficient processing capacity, determining a number of instances based on a difference between the insufficient processing capacity and the expected processing capacity; and

requesting the number of instances.

22. The method of claim 17, wherein assigning a task of the one or more computing tasks to a second instance of the plurality of instances includes assigning a task to migrate at least one of an e-mail, a task, a contact, an instant message, a text, a chat, a calendar, a folder, or a document.

33. The method of claim 17, further comprising reassigning a task from an on-demand instance to a reserved instances responsive to determining that the reserved instance became available.

37. The method of claim 17, further comprising responsive to determining that an expected processing capacity of an instance is less than or equal to an insufficient processing capacity of the instance, requesting allocation of new on-demand instances using a cloud service API of one of at least one of the one or more cloud service providers.

23. An apparatus, comprising:

a memory component; and

a processing component that is arranged to operate on data to enable actions, the actions comprising;

enumerating a plurality of instances, each of the plurality of instances configured to execute one or more computing tasks associated with migration of mailbox content from a source electronic messaging system to a destination electronic messaging system, wherein the plurality of instances comprise one or more reserved instances or one or more on-demand instances, the on-demand instances obtained from one or more cloud service providers;

terminating a first instance of the plurality of instances;

determining a workload of each instance of the instances;

assigning a task of the one or more computing tasks to a second instance of the plurality of instances based on the determined workload; and

requesting new instances.

24. The apparatus of claim 23, wherein enumerating a plurality of instances comprises:

enumerating the plurality of instances and states of the plurality of instances;

identifying unfilled instances of the plurality of instances;

identifying pending instances of the plurality of instances; and

identifying registered and unregistered instances of the plurality of instances.

25. The apparatus of claim 23, wherein assigning a task of a plurality of tasks to a second instance of the plurality of instances based on the determined workload comprises:

assigning the task to the second instance responsive to determining that the current workload of the second instance is less than the capacity of the second instance.

26. The apparatus of claim 23, further comprising:

retrieving the plurality of tasks from a web service.

27. The apparatus of claim 26, wherein retrieving the plurality of tasks from a web service comprises:

retrieving configuration information associated with each task of the plurality of tasks, information associated with one or more mailboxes, a location of the source electronic messaging system, a location of the destination electronic messaging system, mailbox credentials, or a combination thereof.

28. The apparatus of claim 23, wherein assigning a task of the one or more computing tasks to a second instance of the plurality of instances includes assigning a task to migrate at least one of an e-mail, a task, a contact, an instant message, a text, a chat, a calendar, a folder, or a document.

34. The apparatus of claim 23, wherein the actions further comprise reassigning a task from an on-demand instance to a reserved instances responsive to determining that the reserved instance became available.

38. The apparatus of claim 23, wherein the actions further comprise responsive to determining that an expected processing capacity of an instance is less than or equal to an insufficient processing capacity of the instance, requesting allocation of new on-demand instances using a cloud service API of one of at least one of the one or more cloud service providers.