Modeling IT operations/policies

• US 7,941,309 B2
• Filed: 11/02/2005
• Issued: 05/10/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 11/02/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Grealish, Kevin D. J., Parham, Jeffrey B., Outhred, Geoffrey H., Dublish, Pratul, Tabbara, Bassam, Garg, Praerit
• Primary Examiner(s): FREJD, RUSSELL WARREN
• Application Number:
  US11/266,156
• Publication Number:
  US 20070112847A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,015 Days
• Field of Search: 703/13, 703/22, 707/999, 707/103, 707/999.103, 709/224
• US Class Current: 703/13
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/577 Assessing vulnerabilities and evaluating computer system security
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling

Abstract

Modeling operational policies of operating a business'"'"'s or institution'"'"'s actual or planned IT system. The IT system may include components such as applications, application hosts, one or more networks or components thereof, hardware, and interrelationships between the components. The IT system is to be operated in accordance with operational policies that govern existence or numerosity of components, how the components are interrelated, how the components and interrelationships are configured, and/or manual or automated processes for managing and maintaining the IT system. The modeling may involve generating code that conforms to a language by declaring abstractions using types that correspond to the components of the IT system, by declaring types of interrelationships that correspond to the interrelationships of the IT system, and by defining constraints upon and between the abstract types, where the constraints correspond to operational policies of operating the IT system.

Claims

1. A method, the method comprising:

generating, on a computer, a model of an information technology (IT) system that models policies for deploying, configuring, and operating the IT system, the model comprising type declarations in the typing syntax of a declarative language, where the type declarations together model the policies for configuring and operating the IT system, and where the type declarations declare types of classes/components of the IT system, types of relationships between classes/components of the IT system, and constraints of the IT system, wherein the types of classes/components comprise types of hosts, types of servers, and types of applications, and wherein the types of relationships comprise hosting relationships, dependency relationships, delegation relationships, and communications relationships; and

storing the model in a computer readable medium.

2. A method according to claim 1, wherein the constraints model constraints of operating, deploying, and configuring the IT system.

3. A method according to claim 1, wherein a new model is derived from the model by adding a declaration that either extends the model with a new declaration or that restricts the model by restricting a type declared in the model.

4. One or more computer-readable media having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, upon execution by a computer, program the computer to perform operations as recited in claim 1.

5. A method, the method comprising:

generating, on a computer, a model of an information technology (IT) system that models policies for deploying, configuring, and operating the IT system, the model comprising type declarations in the typing syntax of a declarative language, where the type declarations together model the policies for configuring and operating the IT system, and where the type declarations declare types of classes/components of the IT system, types of relationships between classes/components of the IT system, and constraints of the IT system, wherein the constraints comprise expressions comprising operators operating on components of the IT system and/or relationships of the IT system, where the expressions can be evaluated for truth to determine whether the constraint is satisfied, where the declarative language has an expression syntax for constructing expressions, and the expressions that comprise the constraints are in a form complying with the expression syntax; and

storing the model in a computer readable medium.

6. A method, the method comprising:

generating, on a computer, a model of an information technology (IT) system that models policies for deploying, configuring, and operating the IT system, the model comprising type declarations in the typing syntax of a declarative language, where the type declarations together model the policies for configuring and operating the IT system, and where the type declarations declare types of classes/components of the IT system, types of relationships between classes/components of the IT system, and constraints of the IT system;

passing an instance of the model to an implementation of the language that comprises at least a type checking algorithm and that verifies whether the instance satisfies the policies of the model; and

storing the model in a computer readable medium.

7. A method according to claim 6, wherein the types of classes/components comprise types of hosts, types of servers, and types of applications, and wherein the types of relationships comprise hosting relationships, dependency relationships, delegation relationships, and communications relationships.

8. One or more computer-readable media having stored thereon computer-executable instructions comprising:

computer-executable instructions that, upon execution by a computer, program the computer with a definition of a model of an information technology (IT) system, the definition comprising;

source or compiled code of a declarative language, the source or compiled code comprising;

declarations of types software and hardware components, where the types of components are declared to have properties that model policies of operating the IT system;

declarations of types of relationships between components, where the types of relationships are declared to have properties that model policies of operating the IT system; and

declarations of constraints on the relationships and components, where the constraints constrain combinations of relationships and components in a way that models policies of operating the IT system, wherein some of the constraints further comprise information indicating classifications of the constraints; and

the computer executable-instructions further comprising a component that, upon execution by the computer, programs the computer to employ the definition to determine whether the IT system is being operated in accordance with the policies of operating the IT system.

9. One or more computer-readable media according to claim 8, where the definition further comprises restrictive derivations of that extend or refine the policies of operating the IT system.

10. One or more computer-readable media according to claim 8, wherein the declarations of the constraints comprise expressions comprising operators operating on components and/or relationships, where the expressions are susceptible to truth evaluation.

11. One or more computer-readable media having stored thereon computer-executable instructions comprising:

computer-executable instructions that, upon execution by a computer, program the computer with a definition of a model of an information technology (IT) system, the definition comprising;

source or compiled code of a declarative language, the source or compiled code comprising;

declarations of types software and hardware components, where the types of components are declared to have properties that model policies of operating the IT system;

declarations of types of relationships between components, where the types of relationships are declared to have properties that model policies of operating the IT system; and

declarations of constraints on the relationships and components, where the constraints constrain combinations of relationships and components in a way that models policies of operating the IT system; and

where the definition specifies invariant aspects of the IT system that must be satisfied for the IT system; and

the computer executable-instructions further comprising a component that, upon execution by the computer, programs the computer to employ the definition to determine whether the IT system is being operated in accordance with the specified invariant aspects of the IT system.

12. One or more computer-readable media having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, upon execution by a computer, program the computer with a definition of a model of an IT system, the definition comprising:

source or compiled code of a declarative language, the source or compiled code comprising;

declarations of types software and hardware components, where the types of components are declared to have properties that model policies of operating the IT system;

declarations of types of relationships between components, where the types of relationships are declared to have properties that model policies of operating the IT system; and

declarations of constraints on the relationships and components, where the constraints constrain combinations of relationships and components in a way that models policies of operating the IT system; and

the computer executable-instructions further comprising;

information indicating a state of the IT system; and

a component for using the definition to determine whether changes to the state of the IT system would violate the policies of operating the IT system.

13. One or more computer-readable media having stored thereon computer-executable instructions comprising:

computer-executable instructions that, upon execution by a computer, program the computer with a definition of a model of an information technology (IT) system, the definition comprising;

source or compiled code of a declarative language, the source or compiled code comprising;

declarations of types software and hardware components, where the types of components are declared to have properties that model policies of operating the IT system;

declarations of types of relationships between components, where the types of relationships are declared to have properties that model policies of operating the IT system; and

declarations of constraints on the relationships and components, where the constraints constrain combinations of relationships and components in a way that models policies of operating the IT system; and

the computer-executable instructions further comprising a definition of a second model derived from the model by adding a declaration that either extends the model with a new declaration or that restricts the model by restricting a type declared in the model; and

the computer executable-instructions further comprising a component that, upon execution by the computer, programs the computer to employ the definitions to determine whether the IT system is being operated in accordance with at least one of the models of the IT system.

14. One or more computer-readable media according to claim 13, wherein some of the constraints further comprise information indicating classifications of the constraints.

15. A method of modeling operational policies of operating a business'"'"'s or institution'"'"'s actual or planned information technology (IT) system, where the IT system comprises components comprising applications, application hosts, one or more networks or components thereof, hardware, and interrelationships between the components, and the IT system is to be operated in accordance with operational policies that govern existence or numerosity of components, how the components are interrelated, how the components and interrelationships are configured, and manual or automated processes for managing and maintaining the IT system, the method comprising:

generating, on a computer, code that conforms to a language by;

declaring types of classes that correspond to the components of the IT system;

declaring types of interrelationships that correspond to the interrelationships of the IT system; and

defining constraints upon and between the types, where the constraints correspond to the operational policies of operating the IT system; and

wherein the code is independent of the IT system.

16. A method according to claim 15, wherein the types are declared with portions of declarative code in accordance with syntax and semantics of a typing system of the language.

17. A method according to claim 16, wherein the constraints comprise expressions that are within the universe of boolean expressions defined by the language.

18. A method according to claim 17, wherein the constraints constrain some of the abstract types such that instances of the abstract types can be validated against the constraints.

19. A method according to claim 15, further comprising automatically determining whether instances of the declared types satisfy operational policies modeled by the types.

20. A method according to claim 15, further comprising automatically determining whether a proposed modification to an instance of one of the types would violate the operational policies.