Policy-Based Alert Filtering for Networked Storage Monitoring
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Solution Overview
Problem
Storage administrators in networked storage systems face overwhelming data management tasks due to the numerous components and counters associated with storage infrastructure, making it difficult to efficiently monitor and provide relevant information based on user needs.
Innovation Solution
A method and system that allow administrators to create policies for specific logical objects, assign annotation categories, set threshold values, and generate alerts based on policy violations, enabling selective and efficient monitoring of resource usage.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Loss of information
If all data associated with various objects and counters is provided to storage administrators, then complete monitoring information is available, but the administrators become overwhelmed and cannot efficiently manage the system
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the overwhelming monitoring data by introducing policies that divide counters into different categories (important, less important, not important) based on user-defined criteria. This segmentation allows administrators to focus on critical information while automatically filtering out noise, resolving the contradiction between information completeness and ease of operation.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces policies as an intermediary layer between the monitoring system and administrators. These policies act as filters that automatically process and prioritize counter data before presenting it to administrators, eliminating the need for administrators to manually sift through all raw data while ensuring important information is not lost.
2Reliability
If monitoring data from all storage infrastructure components is collected, then comprehensive system visibility is achieved, but the complexity of managing and processing this data increases significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies segmentation by categorizing counters into importance levels through user-defined policies. This reduces data management complexity by organizing comprehensive monitoring data into structured groups, allowing the system to maintain reliable monitoring of all components while presenting simplified, prioritized information to administrators.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes the parameter of data presentation by transforming raw counter data into policy-based alert levels (important, less important, not important). This parameter transformation maintains comprehensive system visibility while significantly reducing the complexity of data processing and management by automatically filtering and prioritizing information.
3Reliability
If alerts are generated for all policy violations, then complete policy enforcement is ensured, but unnecessary alerts increase administrative overhead
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments policy violation alerts into different priority levels based on user-defined policies. By categorizing alerts as important, less important, or not important, the system ensures complete policy enforcement is maintained while reducing administrative overhead by allowing administrators to focus on high-priority alerts and automatically suppress or defer lower-priority notifications.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements partial action by selectively generating alerts based on policy-defined priorities. Instead of notifying administrators of every policy violation, the system applies partial alerting where only violations meeting certain criteria (importance levels, threshold breaches) trigger notifications, thereby maintaining reliable policy enforcement while minimizing unnecessary administrative interruptions and time loss.
Data Source
AI summary
Methods and systems for a storage system are provided. The methods include maintaining a logical object associated with a resource of a storage system by a management console; creating a first policy associated with the logical object; selecting an annotation category associated with the logical object and assigning a value to the annotation category, where the annotation category defines an attribute associated with the logical object; providing a duration for generating an alert when the first policy is violated; assigning a threshold value for first policy violation; and setting an indicator for foregoing an alert associated with a second policy, when the first policy is violated.