Interactive Flow Map for Distributed System Topology Monitoring
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Solution Overview
Problem
The complexity of monitoring and maintaining high service performance and user experience in distributed web services is exacerbated by the difficulty in tracking and monitoring interconnected machines, making it challenging to identify and visualize performance issues across disparate systems and layers in network architectures.
Innovation Solution
A system and method for displaying a visual topology of a monitored distributed system, which includes receiving performance data, identifying nodes of interest, generating an interactive flow map, and providing a user interface to visually distinguish nodes of interest and their connected chains, indicating hop distance through fading, color, size, thickness, or transparency, to facilitate easy identification of problems.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If companies distribute applications over multiple interconnected machines to enhance service performance, then service capability and scalability are improved, but the complexity of tracking and monitoring the topology increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an intermediary system that automatically discovers and maps the distributed application topology. This intermediary mechanism tracks service calls and node connections, presenting a simplified view to users without requiring manual topology management, thus resolving the contradiction between distributed service capability and monitoring complexity
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces manual topology tracking and monitoring mechanisms with automated electronic discovery and mapping systems. The system automatically identifies nodes, traces service call chains, and generates visual representations, substituting mechanical manual processes with automated computational methods to reduce monitoring complexity
2Adaptability or versatility
If the distributed system uses multiple layers and interconnected nodes to handle transactions, then service functionality is enhanced, but the difficulty of identifying and visualizing performance issues increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts and highlights only the relevant portions of the distributed system that are experiencing performance issues. When a problem is detected, the system automatically identifies the affected nodes and service call chains, extracting this specific information from the complex overall topology and presenting it in a focused visual representation, thereby reducing the difficulty of identifying performance issues
Solution Approach 2:
The patent employs color-coded visual indicators to represent different performance states and issue types in the topology map. Nodes and connections are colored based on their performance status, allowing users to quickly identify and locate performance issues through visual cues rather than analyzing raw data, thus enhancing the ease of detecting and measuring performance problems
Data Source
AI summary
In one aspect, a system for displaying a visual topology of a monitored distributed system is disclosed. The system includes a processor; a memory; and one or more modules stored in the memory and executable by a processor to perform operations including: receive data associated with a monitored application performed over a distributed system of interconnected nodes of machines; identify nodes of interest and one or more chains of nodes connected to the nodes of interest from the interconnected nodes based on the received data; generate an interactive flow map of the interconnected nodes in the distributed system; provide a user interface for displaying the interactive flow map; and automatically display the interactive flow map through the provided user interface to visually distinguish the identified nodes of interest and the one or more chains of nodes connected to the nodes of interest from rest of the interconnected nodes.