Model-based policy application

• US 7,689,676 B2
• Filed: 01/12/2007
• Issued: 03/30/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 03/06/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: ServiceNow Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Fries, Robert, Tabbara, Bassam, Voloshin, Vitaly, Healy, Michael J., Rajarajan, Vij, Narayanan, Rajagopalan Badri, James, David C., Mensching, Rob, Copeland, Bruce W., Pan, Zhengkai Kenneth, Sanghvi, Ashvinkumar J., Hunt, Galen C., Hardwick, Jonathan C., Lakshminarayanan, Anand, Parchem, John M., Lassettre, Edwin R., Welland, Robert V., Woolsey, Jeffrey A., Vinberg, Anders B., Vega, Rene Antonio, Winner, Eric J., Hydrie, Aamer, Papaefstathiou, Efstathios, Grealish, Kevin D. J., McCollum, Raymond W., Outhred, Geoffrey H., Mohammed, Mazhar, Wilson, John H.
• Primary Examiner(s): BATES, KEVIN T
• Application Number:
  US11/622,978
• Publication Number:
  US 20080059214A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,173 Days
• Field of Search: 709/220, 709/221, 709/223, 703/20, 703/21, 715/734, 715/735, 715/736
• US Class Current: 709/220
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/6236 between heterogeneous systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2221/2101 Auditing as a secondary aspect
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/61 Installation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/44505 Configuring for program initiating, e.g. using registry, configuration files
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/067 Enterprise or organisation modelling

Abstract

In accordance with certain aspects of the model-based policy application, each of a plurality of policies is associated with appropriate parts of a model of a heterogeneous system. A deployment agent is invoked to apply each of the plurality of policies to components associated with the parts of the model. An identification of a change to one of the plurality of policies is received, and the deployment agent is also invoked to apply the changed policy to selected ones of the components associated with the parts of the model.

Claims

1. One or more computer storage media having stored thereon a plurality of instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, causes the one or more processors to perform a method, the method comprising:

associating a type, an instance, and one or more configurations with components of a system, each type, instance, and configuration having its own information page corresponding to a particular component, wherein;

the type is a general template having corresponding information page that describes the type to which the particular component corresponds;

the configuration is a specific template including specific information for a particular class of the type;

the instance is a specific occurrence of the type or the configuration and corresponding to the particular component;

information contained in information page associated with the instance is more specific or restrictive than the information contained in information pages associated with the configuration, unless instructed otherwise by a user; and

information contained in information page associated with the configuration is more specific or restrictive than the information contained in information pages associated with the type, unless instructed otherwise by the user;

associating one or more information pages with components of the system to define a model of the system, wherein;

each component comprises at least one of;

an application,

a particular hardware on a computer,

a virtual machine,

a computer, or

a group of multiple computers;

each information page represents a specification for an associated component, each information page comprising at least two of following distinct pages;

a policy page,

an installation page,

a constraint page,

a monitoring page

a service level agreement page, or

a description page,

the model defines one or more relationships among the components, the relationships including;

a containment relationship;

a hosting relationship;

or

a communication relationship; and

the model supports deployment of a plurality of policies, wherein each policy applies to a subset of the system such that a system component affected by a first policy is not affected by a second policy;

associating two or more policies with particular components based on the information in a policy page associated with the particular components, the two or more policies comprising;

a software deployment policy;

a software configuration management policy;

a data protection policy;

an inventory data policy;

a health monitoring policy;

a workload deployment policy;

or

a task execution policy;

making the model accessible to various utilities or other applications involved in managing the system;

receiving an identification of a change to one of the policies;

identifying appropriate components of the model to which the changed policy applies;

associating the changed policy with the identified appropriate components of the model; and

invoking a deployment agent to apply the changed policy to the identified appropriate components of the system associated with the parts of the model.

2. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 1, the method further comprising:

receiving an identification of a change to the system, the change to the system being at least one of;

addition of a component to the system,

removal of a component from the system,

change of a type of a component of the system, or

addition, removal, or modification of a relationship among the components of the system;

associating appropriate policies with the components affected by the change to the system; and

applying appropriate policies to the affected components in the system.

3. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 1, wherein associating one or more policies with particular components based on the information in a policy page associated with the particular components comprises:

receiving a policy for particular components of the system;

identifying appropriate components of the system to which the policy applies; and

associating the policy with the identified appropriate components.

4. One or more computer storage media as recited in claim 3, wherein identifying appropriate components of the system comprises accessing information pages associated with the components of the system and identifying, from the information in the information pages, the components of the system to which the policy applies.

5. A method comprising:

establishing, by a computing device configured to provide model-based policy functionality, a plurality parts of a model of a system,

the establishing including associating, by the computing device, a type, an instance, and one or more configurations with components of the system, each type, instance, and configuration having its own information page corresponding to a particular component, wherein;

the type is a general template having corresponding information page that describes the type to which the particular component corresponds;

the configuration is a specific template including specific information for a particular class of the type;

the instance is a specific occurrence of the type or the configuration and corresponding to the particular component;

information contained in information page associated with the instance is more specific or restrictive than the information contained in information pages associated with the configuration, unless instructed otherwise by a user; and

information contained in information page associated with the configuration is more specific or restrictive than the information contained in information pages associated with the type, unless instructed otherwise by the user;

the information page includes one or more policies;

receiving, by the computing device, multiple policies for a part of the model of the system

for a first policy of the multiple policies;

identifying, by the computing device, a first part of the model of the system to which the first policy applies;

associating, by the computing device, the first policy with the identified first part; and

invoking, by the computing device, a deployment agent to apply the first policy to components of the system corresponding to the identified first part of the model; and

for a second policy of the multiple policies;

identifying, by the computing device, a second part of the model of the system to which the second policy applies;

associating, by the computing device, the second policy with the identified second part; and

invoking, by the computing device, the deployment agent to apply the second policy to components of the system corresponding to the identified second part of the model,

wherein;

the first policy is different from the second policy; and

the first part of the model is different from the second part of the model.

6. A method as recited in claim 5, wherein all policies that apply to the system are associated with selected parts of the model of the system.

7. A method as recited in claim 5, further comprising performing, by the computing device, management of the system using the model of the system, the management of the system including deploying software to components of the system and monitoring health of the system.

8. A method as recited in claim 5, further comprising maintaining, by the computing device, the model of the system at a central repository.

9. A method as recited in claim 8, further comprising maintaining, by the computing device, at least a portion of the model at selected components of the system.

10. A method as recited in claim 5, further comprising changing, by the computing device, the policy for one part of the model based on one or more other parts of the model.

11. A method as recited in claim 5, wherein identifying parts of the model comprises accessing, by the computing device, information pages associated with components of the model and identifying, from the information in the information pages, the components of the model to which the policy applies.

12. A method as recited in claim 5, wherein identifying parts of the model comprises accessing, by the computing device, relationship information associated with components of the model and identifying, by the computing device, from the relationship information, the components of the model to which the policy applies.

13. A method as recited in claim 5, wherein the model defines one or more relationships among the components.

14. A method as recited in claim 13, wherein the relationships include a containment relationship, a hosting relationship, or a communication relationship.

15. A method comprising:

associating, by a computing device configured to provide model-based policy functionality, one or more information pages with components of a system to define a model of the system,

the associating including associating, by the computing device, a type, an instance, and one or more configurations with components of the system, each type, instance, and configuration having its own information page corresponding to a particular component, wherein;

the type is a general template having corresponding information page that describes the type to which the particular component corresponds;

the configuration is a specific template including specific information for a particular class of the type;

the instance is a specific occurrence of the type or the configuration and corresponding to the particular component;

information contained in information page associated with the instance is more specific or restrictive than the information contained in information pages associated with the configuration, unless instructed otherwise by a user; and

information contained in information page associated with the configuration is more specific or restrictive than the information contained in information panes associated with the type, unless instructed otherwise by the user;

wherein;

each component comprises at least one of;

an application,

a particular hardware on a computer,

a virtual machine,

a computer, or

a group of multiple computers;

each information page represents a specification for an associated component, each information page comprising at least two of following distinct pages;

a policy page,

an installation page,

a constraint page,

a monitoring page

a service level agreement page, or

a description page,

the model defines one or more relationships among the components, the relationships including;

a containment relationship;

a hosting relationship;

or

a communication relationship; and

the model supports deployment of a plurality of policies, wherein each policy applies to a subset of the system such that a system component affected by a first policy is not affected by a second policy;

associating, by the computing device, two or more policies with particular components based on the information in a policy page associated with the particular components, the two or more policies comprising;

a software deployment policy;

a software configuration management policy;

a data protection policy;

an inventory data policy;

a health monitoring policy;

a workload deployment policy;

or

a task execution policy;

making, by the computing device, the model accessible to various utilities or other applications involved in managing the system;

receiving, by the computing device, an indication of a change to a policy of the system;

identifying, by the computing device, appropriate components of the model of the system that are affected by the change, each of the one or more components having an associated policy;

modifying, by the computing device, each policy associated with the identified appropriate components to reflect the change, the modifying comprising adding, deleting, or replacing a changed policy in the policy page; and

invoking, by the computing device, a deployment agent to apply the changed policy to the identified appropriate components of the system.

16. A method as recited in claim 15, further comprising:

receiving, by the computing device, an identification of a change to the system, the change to the system being addition of a component to the system;

associating, by the computing device, the policy with one or more parts of the model associated with the added component; and

invoking, by the computing device, the deployment agent to apply the policy to the added component in the system.

17. A method as recited in claim 15, wherein identifying appropriate components of the model comprises accessing, by the computing device, information pages associated with components of the model and identifying, from the information in the information pages, one or more components of the model to which the policy applies.

18. A method as recited in claim 15, further comprising changing, by the computing device, the policy for appropriate components of the model based on one or more other parts of the model.

19. A method as recited in claim 15, wherein identifying appropriate components of the model comprises accessing, by the computing device, relationship information associated with components of the model and identifying, from the relationship information, the components of the model to which the policy applies.

20. A method as recited in claim 15, further comprising performing, by the computing device, management of the system using the model of the system, the management of the system including deploying software to components of the system and predicting capacity of the system.