Methods and apparatus for managing heterogeneous storage devices

• US 6,769,022 B1
• Filed: 07/09/1999
• Issued: 07/27/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 07/09/1999
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: NetApp, Inc.
• Original Assignee: LSI Logic Corporation (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Weber, Bret S., Delaney, William P., DeKoning, Rodney A., Jantz, Ray M., Courtright, William V. II
• Primary Examiner(s): Alam, Hosain
• Assistant Examiner(s): NGUYEN, THU HA T
• Application Number:
  US09/350,739
• Time in Patent Office: 1,845 Days
• Field of Search: 709/202, 709/221-224, 709/203, 709/246, 710/18, 714/31, 714/26, 704/223
• US Class Current: 709/223
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0213 Standardised network management protocols, e.g. simple network management protocol [SNMP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0253 using browsers or web-pages for accessing management information
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/046 comprising network management agents or mobile agents therefor
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/06 Management of faults, events, alarms or notifications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0813 characterised by the conditions triggering a change of settings
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/082 the condition being updates or upgrades of network functionality
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0856 by backing up or archiving configuration information
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0859 by keeping history of different configuration generations or by rolling back to previous configuration versions
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/12 Discovery or management of network topologies
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/00 Arrangements for monitoring or testing data switching networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/045 for graphical visualisation of monitoring data
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/065 related to network devices
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0811 by checking connectivity
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0817 by checking functioning
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/133 Protocols for remote procedure calls [RPC]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/75 Indicating network or usage conditions on the user display
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

A system for monitoring and managing devices on network comprising one or more managed devices connected to the network and storage means for storing a device management application program associated with each of the managed devices. The system further includes a management station which is in communication with each of the managed devices across the network, and the management station is in communication with the storage means. When a user wishes to monitor, configure, or manage one of the managed devices on the network, the user preferably selects the managed device to be managed and the management station retrieves from the storage means the device management application program associated with the selected managed device. By the management station processing the management application program for the selected managed device, the management station allows the user to monitor the status of the managed device, as well as change the configuration of and fix errors with the managed device.

Claims

1. A system for monitoring and managing devices on a computer system, comprising:

a managed device;

storage means for storing a device management application program associated with said managed device; and

a management station in communication with said managed device and said storage means, said management station configured to retrieve said device management application program from said storage means and process said device management application program;

wherein the processing of said device management application program by said management station allows said management station to monitor and manage said managed device, said device management application program generating remote procedure call commands that are sent to a controller of said managed device, said controller including a conversion application for converting remote procedure call commands to input/output read/write commands which said controller processes to perform a system management function on said managed device.

2. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein the processing of said device management application program by said management station provides a view of a status of said managed device on a display associated with said management station.

3. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein said managed device includes a controller for controlling said managed device, and wherein the processing of said device management application program by said management station allows said management station to send management commands to said controller.

4. The system as recited in claim 3, wherein said managed device is a storage system.

5. The system as recited in claim 4, wherein said controller resides within said storage system.

6. The system as recited in claim 4, wherein said storage system is connected to a computer, and said controller resides within said computer.

7. The system as recited in claim 6, wherein said computer may be a work station computer or a server computer.

8. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein said computer system is a network computer system.

9. The system as recited in claim 8, comprising a plurality of managed devices connected to said network computer system, each one of said plurality of managed devices being of a device type, and wherein said storage means stores a device management application program associated with each of said device types.

10. The system as recited in claim 9, wherein two or more of said plurality of managed devices are of a same device type, but processing different versions of a control software for said device type, and wherein said storage means stores a device management application program associated with each version of said control software for said device type.

11. The system as recited in claim 9, wherein said storage means further stores a system monitoring application, which when processed by said management station, said management station can monitor the status of each of said plurality of managed devices on said network computer system.

12. The system as recited in claim 11, wherein monitoring the status of each of said plurality of managed devices on said network computer system, includes:

discovering each of said plurality of managed devices on said network, and displaying the status of each of said plurality of managed devices on a display associated with said management station;

maintaining an association between each of said plurality of managed devices and said device management application programs associated with each of said plurality of managed devices, so that when a user selects one or more of said plurality of managed devices to be managed, said management station selects the device management application program(s) associated with said selected one or more of said plurality of managed devices; and

monitoring said network for event notifications communicated from any one of said plurality of managed devices.

13. The system as recited in claim 12, wherein said event notifications are notifications of a configuration change of, a status change of, or an error with said any one of said plurality of managed devices.

14. The system as recited in claim 12, wherein said step of monitoring said network further comprises the steps of:

said system monitoring application initiating an event monitoring application on one or more of said plurality of said managed devices; and

when an event on said one or more of said plurality of managed devices occurs, said event monitoring application notifying said system monitoring application of said event.

15. The system as recited in claim 14, wherein said event monitoring application comprises a hanging asynchronous event notification process running on said controller of said one or more of said plurality of managed devices.

16. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein said storage means comprises a read only memory (ROM) within said management station.

17. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein said computer system comprises a network computer system and said storage means comprises a storage system on said network.

18. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein said storage means comprises a storage system connected to said management station.

19. The system as recited in claim 4, wherein said storage system may be a storage system selected from the group of storage systems, comprising a RAID storage array, a file server, and a JBOD (just a bunch of disk) storage array.

20. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein said management station comprises java processing means for processing java applets or applications, and wherein said device management application programs comprise java applets.

21. A method for managing devices on a network, comprising the steps of:

providing a management station for managing one or more managed devices on said network;

locating said one or more managed devices on said network;

displaying said located managed devices on a display associated with said management station;

selecting one of said one or more managed devices to be managed;

retrieving a management application program associated with said selected one of said one or more managed devices from a storage means;

running said retrieved management application program on said management station; and

sending management commands from said management station to said selected one of said one or more managed devices,

wherein said management commands from said management station are remote procedure call commands, said remote procedure call commands being converted to input/output read/write commands which a controller of said selected one of said one or more managed devices processes to perform a system management function on said selected one of said one or more managed devices.

22. A system for monitoring and managing devices on a computer system, comprising:

a plurality of managed devices each being of a device type;

storage means for storing a system monitoring application and a device management application program associated with each of said device types, and

a management station in communication with said managed device and said storage means, said management station configured to retrieve said system monitoring application program and said device management application programs and process said system monitoring application program and said device management application programs;

the processing of said system monitoring application program by said management station allows said management station to monitor and display the status of each of said plurality of managed devices on said computer system; and

when a user, using said management station, selects a managed device to be managed from said plurality of managed devices displayed on said management station by said system monitoring application program, said management station invokes the processing of a device management application program associated with said selected managed device which allows said management station to monitor and manage said selected managed device, said device management application program generating remote procedure call commands that are sent to a controller of said selected managed device, said controller including a conversion application for converting remote procedure call commands to input/output read/write commands which said controller processes to perform a system management function on said selected managed device.