Cross-Cloud Vendor Mapping Service for Usage Tracking
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Solution Overview
Problem
In a dynamic cloud marketplace, tracking and aggregating software usage history across a shifting sequence of provisioning clouds is challenging due to the need for continuous registration and data extraction from multiple vendors and clouds, making it difficult for both cloud marketplace systems and users to manage billing and subscription effectively.
Innovation Solution
A cross-cloud vendor mapping service is implemented to capture and aggregate software usage history across different provisioning clouds, using an external mapping service that registers and tracks usage data independently, allowing for seamless billing and subscription management without requiring users or cloud marketplace systems to reset or re-register with each change in cloud providers.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If users and cloud marketplace systems continuously register and extract usage data from each new cloud provider, then billing and subscription tracking can be maintained, but the administrative burden and system complexity increase significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a cross-cloud usage mapping service as an intermediary component that sits between the cloud marketplace system and multiple cloud providers. This mapping service maintains usage data and translates between different cloud providers' data formats, allowing the cloud marketplace system to track billing and subscriptions without directly interacting with each cloud provider. This resolves the contradiction by maintaining billing accuracy while significantly reducing system complexity and administrative burden.
2Reliability
If the cloud marketplace system directly manages usage tracking across multiple dynamic clouds, then accurate billing can be achieved, but the system's adaptability to cloud provider changes decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the billing and usage tracking functionality into a separate cross-cloud mapping service component. This segmentation allows the cloud marketplace system to remain agnostic to specific cloud providers, while the mapping service handles the complexity of interacting with different cloud providers' data formats and protocols. When cloud providers change, only the mapping service needs to be updated, not the entire cloud marketplace system, thus maintaining billing accuracy while improving adaptability to dynamic changes.
3Loss of information
If users must re-register with each new cloud provider in the sequence, then usage data can be captured, but the user experience and service continuity deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The cross-cloud mapping service acts as an intermediary that maintains continuous usage data across cloud provider transitions. Instead of requiring users to re-register with each new cloud provider, the mapping service automatically tracks and translates usage data from different cloud providers, presenting a unified view to users. This preserves usage data capture while significantly improving user experience and service continuity.
Data Source
AI summary
Systems and methods for cross-cloud computing resource usage tracking. An example method comprises: receiving a request comprising an operational specification of a computing resource; selecting a first provisioning cloud in view of the operational specification; receiving an updated operational specification of the computing resource; receiving a first provisioning offer from the first provisioning cloud and a second provisioning offer from a second provisioning cloud responsive to the updated operational specification; selecting the second provisioning cloud in view of the first and second provisioning offers; providing an interface between the first computing resource and a second computing resource residing in a second provisioning cloud; and tracking resource usage data of the first computing resource across the provisioning clouds.