Cloud Control Plane for Inventory Data Replication Across SDDCs
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Solution Overview
Problem
Managing inventory data across multiple software-defined data centers (SDDCs) deployed across different geographical regions and in a hybrid manner is challenging, as existing technologies lack efficient mechanisms for compliance monitoring, upgrade management, and unified inventory viewing and management.
Innovation Solution
A method involving a cloud control plane that detects changes in inventory data, updates a desired state document, and replicates these changes across all SDDCs using a database, ensuring synchronized inventory management and compliance across geographically dispersed SDDCs.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If inventory data is managed independently in each SDDC, then each data center can operate autonomously, but compliance monitoring and unified inventory management become complex and difficult across multiple geographically dispersed data centers
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a cloud control plane as an intermediary that mediates between multiple SDDCs and the centralized inventory management system. The cloud control plane receives inventory data from various SDDCs, processes it according to company policies, and distributes updated desired state documents back to the SDDCs, thereby simplifying compliance monitoring while preserving autonomous operation.
Solution Approach 2:
The system segments inventory management into two parts: local inventory data collection at each SDDC (maintaining autonomy) and centralized policy enforcement through the cloud control plane (simplifying compliance). This segmentation allows each SDDC to operate independently while the cloud control plane handles unified compliance monitoring.
2Ease of operation
If inventory data is replicated across all SDDCs, then unified inventory management is achieved, but data synchronization and consistency become challenging across geographically dispersed locations
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses copying by creating desired state documents that contain inventory data templates. Instead of continuously replicating live data across all SDDCs, the system copies the desired state configuration from the cloud control plane to each SDDC, ensuring consistency while reducing synchronization complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs preliminary action by pre-defining the desired state of inventory data in the cloud control plane before distribution. This allows SDDCs to proactively update their local inventory data to match the predetermined desired state, ensuring consistency before potential conflicts arise.
3Ease of manufacture
If manual inventory management is used in each SDDC, then implementation is simple, but compliance with company policies across multiple data centers cannot be efficiently monitored or enforced
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements feedback by having the cloud control plane continuously collect inventory data from SDDCs, compare it against company policies, and generate compliance reports. This automated feedback loop ensures compliance information is captured and enforced across all data centers without increasing implementation complexity at the SDDC level.
Data Source
AI summary
A method of managing the sharing of inventory data across a plurality of data centers, includes the steps of detecting a change made to the inventory data by one of the data centers, updating a desired state document that specifies a desired state of each of the data centers, the updated desired state document including the inventory data as changed, and instructing each of other ones of the data centers to update the inventory data using the updated desired state document. Each of the data centers employ a database for storing the inventory data, and so after the remaining ones of the data centers have updated the inventory data using the updated desired state document, the change made to the inventory data stored in the database of one of the data centers is replicated in the respective databases of the remaining ones of the data centers.