Plugin Change Control Interface for Consistent Tool Governance
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Solution Overview
Problem
Modern application development and deployment tools lack scalability and consistency in change control, especially when integrating disparate tools and third-party tools, leading to inconsistent governance and difficulty in implementing robust change control across various tools within an organization.
Innovation Solution
A change control management system that registers plugin components for requesting, approving, and performing changes, using standardized schemas to manage resources, allowing third-party tools to integrate and enforce consistent policies through a unified interface.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If multiple disparate tools are integrated using additional software, then tool integration capability is improved, but scalability and consistency of change control deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a universal change control interface that multiple disparate tools can connect to through standardized APIs. This interface provides common change control functionality (request submission, approval workflows, compliance checking) that works consistently across different tools including third-party tools, eliminating the need for custom integration software for each tool while maintaining reliability and consistency.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces an intermediary change control interface layer between disparate tools and the change control system. This intermediary receives change requests from various tools through standardized APIs, processes them through unified approval workflows, and enforces consistent governance policies, thereby maintaining reliability while enabling broad tool integration.
2Adaptability or versatility
If custom integration software is developed for each tool, then specific tool integration is improved, but system complexity and maintenance burden increase
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of developing custom integration software for each tool, the patent provides a universal change control interface with standardized APIs that can be used by any tool. This single multi-functional interface handles change control for multiple tools simultaneously, dramatically reducing system complexity and maintenance burden while maintaining the ability to integrate specific tools as needed.
3Adaptability or versatility
If third-party tools are integrated, then tool versatility is improved, but governance consistency deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an intermediary change control interface that all tools including third-party tools must connect to through standardized APIs. This intermediary enforces unified approval workflows, compliance checking, and governance policies on all change requests regardless of source tool, thereby maintaining governance consistency while enabling versatile tool integration.
Solution Approach 2:
The universal change control interface provides consistent governance functionality that works with any tool type including third-party tools. By using the same standardized interface and approval workflows for all tools, the system maintains governance consistency across the entire toolchain while achieving high versatility.
4Reliability
If standardized interfaces are implemented across all tools, then governance consistency is improved, but implementation difficulty increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an intermediary change control interface with standardized APIs that simplifies implementation. Rather than requiring each tool to implement complex governance logic internally, tools can connect to the standardized interface which handles approval workflows, compliance checking, and policy enforcement, thereby achieving governance consistency while reducing implementation difficulty.
Data Source
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AI summary
Extensible change control management for development and deployment of applications is described. A change control manager may register plugin components, including requester, approver and performer components, to process changes to a resource of a resource type, where registering is performed responsive to request(s) received via programmatic interface(s). Upon receiving a change request from the requester component, the change control manager may send the change request to the approver component to approve the change request and, responsive to notification of approval from the approver component, the change control manager may then send the change request to the performer component to implement the requested change. The change control manager and the various components each send and/or receive change requests encoded in a standardized schema for the resource type, the standardized schema independent of the implementation of the resource and the means of implementing changes to the resource by the performer component.