Automated IT Resource Cloning via Stateful Web Service Interfaces
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Current IT resource structures lack a standard, automated means for configuration management and relationship management across heterogeneous resources, making it difficult to clone complex IT environments effectively.
Innovation Solution
A method and system that model the configurational state of each resource as a stateful web service, with new web service interfaces for 'getConfiguration' and 'setConfiguration' operations, allowing for standardized snapshotting and restoration of resource configurations, and modeling relationships between resources as stateful web services relationships.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Extent of automation
If manual configuration management is performed on a per-resource basis, then individual resource configuration can be managed, but system-wide configuration management and automated cloning cannot be achieved
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments configuration management into two distinct layers: (1) individual resource configuration management handled by existing resource-specific interfaces, and (2) system-wide configuration management handled by a new ConfigurationService. This segmentation allows automated cloning at the system level while maintaining compatibility with existing per-resource management approaches.
Solution Approach 2:
The ConfigurationService acts as an intermediary layer between the client and individual resources. It provides standardized web service interfaces for system-wide configuration management and automated cloning, while internally coordinating with individual resource interfaces. This mediator approach enables automated configuration management without requiring changes to existing resource-specific management mechanisms.
2Adaptability or versatility
If standardized web service interfaces are used for resource management, then interoperability between heterogeneous resources is improved, but relationship management between resource configurations is not provided
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges configuration data and relationship information into a unified configuration snapshot. The ConfigurationService retrieves both individual resource configurations and their relationships (topology, dependencies, connections) through standardized web service interfaces, combining them into a complete system-wide configuration representation that enables automated cloning while preserving all relationship information.
3Measurement precision
If per-resource configuration interfaces are used, then individual resource state can be managed, but system-wide configurational view and cloning cannot be achieved
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements preliminary action by creating a complete configuration snapshot before cloning operations. The ConfigurationService retrieves and stores the configurational state of all resources and their relationships in advance (via getConfiguration operation). This pre-captured snapshot can then be rapidly applied to new resources (via setConfiguration operation), enabling efficient automated cloning while maintaining accurate configuration state information.
Data Source
Figure 1A
Figure 1B
Figure 1C
AI summary
The present invention provides a method, system and computer program product for automatically cloning IT resource structure in stateful web services environments by employing a new approach for configuration management. The new approach models the configurational state of each resource as a stateful web service. Configuration data will be provided by this service's resource properties. Relationships between configurations of different resources are modelled as "stateful web services relationships" between web service instances. These relationships can be navigated, which allows to explore the configuration of a whole system in a standards- based way. Additionally a new web service interface is provided by the stateful web service encapsulating the resource. This interface provides two new operations: "getConfiguration" allows an exploiter to take a snapshot of a resource's and related resources' conf igurational state and "setConfiguration" allows for setting the configurational state of a resource to a previously saved state. An invocation of "getConfiguration" results in the creation of a new stateful web service instance that stores the configurational state of each resource. This new web service interface is implemented on a per-resource type basis. Any back-end technology may be used to implement this new web service interface.