Methods and systems for on-boarding applications to a cloud

• US 8,819,679 B2
• Filed: 07/28/2011
• Issued: 08/26/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 07/28/2011
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Agarwal, Vikas, Alexander, Michael Edward, Ananthanarayanan, Rema, Goyal, Sunil, Mittal, Sumit, Mukherjea, Sougata
• Primary Examiner(s): Kawsar, Abdullah Al
• Application Number:
  US13/192,678
• Publication Number:
  US 20130031546A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,125 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 718/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/60 Software deployment
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/06 using stored programs, i.e. using an internal store of processing equipment to receive or retain programs
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5072 Grid computing

Abstract

Methods and arrangements for on-boarding an application to a cloud. An application for hosting in a cloud environment is provided. Metadata related to the application is provided, and metadata related to the cloud is obtained. The application metadata and cloud metadata are compared, and the compatibility of the application with existing offerings of the cloud is ascertained. The application is on-boarded to the cloud.

Claims

1. An apparatus comprising:

at least one processor; and

a computer readable storage medium having computer readable program code embodied therewith and executable by the at least one processor, the computer readable program code comprising;

computer readable program code configured to provide an application for hosting in a cloud environment;

computer readable program code configured to provide metadata related to the application;

computer readable program code configured to obtain metadata related to the cloud;

computer readable program code configured to compare the application metadata and cloud metadata;

computer readable program code configured to ascertain the compatibility of the application with an existing offering of the cloud; and

computer readable program code configured to on-board the application to the cloud via performing the following;

(a) determining whether the application matches an existing offering of the cloud and, if so, mapping the existing offering to the application;

if (a) does not apply;

(b) ascertaining whether a new offering can be defined on the cloud and, if so, deploying the application to the cloud;

if (b) does not apply;

(c) ascertaining whether a template creation tool can create a template of the application for being hosted on the cloud and, if so, hosting the template of the application on the cloud; and

if (c) does not apply;

(d) ascertaining whether it is possible to load the application on a virtual machine on the cloud and, if so, loading the application on a virtual machine on the cloud.

2. A computer program product comprising:

a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having computer readable program code embodied therewith, the computer readable program code comprising;

computer readable program code configured to provide an application for hosting in a cloud environment;

computer readable program code configured to provide metadata related to the application;

computer readable program code configured to obtain metadata related to the cloud;

computer readable program code configured to compare the application metadata and cloud metadata;

computer readable program code configured to ascertain the compatibility of the application with an existing offering of the cloud; and

computer readable program code configured to on-board the application to the cloud via performing the following;

(a) determining whether the application matches an existing offering of the cloud and, if so, mapping the existing offering to the application;

if (a) does not apply;

(b) ascertaining whether a new offering can be defined on the cloud and, if so, deploying the application to the cloud;

if (b) does not apply;

(c) ascertaining whether a template creation tool can create a template of the application for being hosted on the cloud and, if so, hosting the template of the application on the cloud; and

if (c) does not apply;

(d) ascertaining whether it is possible to load the application on a virtual machine on the cloud and, if so, loading the application on a virtual machine on the cloud.

3. The computer program product according to claim 2, wherein the application metadata includes end-user requirements.

4. The computer program product according to claim 2, wherein said computer readable program code is further configured to add a template of the application as a catalog entry if a template of the application can be created for being hosted on the cloud.

5. The computer program product according to claim 2, wherein said computer readable program code is configured to ascertain a possibility of loading the application on a virtual machine via ascertaining whether the application can be loaded manually.

6. The computer program product according to claim 2, wherein said computer readable program code is configured to ascertain a possibility of loading the application on a virtual machine via consulting a virtual machine image library.

7. The computer program product according to claim 6, wherein said computer readable program code is configured to publish how the application may be accessed.

8. The method according to claim 2, wherein said computer readable program code is further configured to check the cloud for back-end services to be integrated with the application.