Policy Enabled Application Release Management Subsystem
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current automated application-release-management systems face challenges in efficiently configuring and managing application-release pipelines across distributed systems, particularly due to the complexity and size of configuration files, which require extensive modifications when pipelines are updated or deployed on different environments.
Innovation Solution
The implementation of configuration-file inheritance and policy-enabled management within the automated application-release-management subsystem, allowing for the combination of multiple configuration files and automatic policy-driven modifications to streamline pipeline configurations and adapt to various execution environments.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If configuration files are used to specify execution environment for application-release pipelines, then pipeline configuration capability is improved, but configuration file complexity and size increase
Solution Approach 1:
The configuration file is divided into multiple inheritance levels (parent configuration files and child configuration files). Each configuration file contains only the specific parameters needed at that level, rather than duplicating all parameters. This segmentation reduces complexity while maintaining comprehensive configuration capability across different execution environments.
Solution Approach 2:
The parent configuration file serves as a universal template that can be inherited by multiple child configuration files for different execution environments. This multi-functional approach allows a single parent configuration to support multiple specialized configurations, reducing overall configuration complexity while maintaining adaptability.
2Adaptability or versatility
If configuration files are modified when pipelines are updated or deployed on different environments, then pipeline adaptability is improved, but modification effort and time increase
Solution Approach 1:
Parent configuration files are prepared in advance with common parameters and settings that will be reused across multiple execution environments. This preliminary action eliminates the need to manually configure common parameters for each new environment, significantly reducing modification effort and time when deploying pipelines to different environments.
Solution Approach 2:
Common configuration parameters are merged into the parent configuration file, while environment-specific parameters are kept in child configuration files. This merging approach allows automatic inheritance of common settings, reducing the manual modification effort required when adapting pipelines to new environments.
3Adaptability or versatility
If extensive modifications are made to configuration files for different environments, then environment-specific optimization is improved, but configuration maintenance complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The configuration hierarchy segments parameters into environment-common (parent) and environment-specific (child) categories. This segmentation maintains environment-specific optimization capability while reducing maintenance complexity, as changes to common parameters need only be made in the parent configuration and are automatically propagated to all child configurations.
Solution Approach 2:
Each configuration file is designed with local quality appropriate to its level: parent configurations contain general, reusable parameters, while child configurations contain only environment-specific overrides. This local quality approach optimizes each configuration for its specific purpose while maintaining overall consistency, reducing maintenance complexity.
Data Source
AI summary
The current document is directed to automated application-release-management facilities that, in a described implementation, coordinate continuous development and release of cloud-computing applications. The application-release-management process is specified, in the described implementation, by application-release-management pipelines, each pipeline comprising one or more stages, with each stage comprising one or more tasks. The currently described methods and systems employ configuration files to specify configuration of the execution environment for application-release-management pipelines, application-release-management-pipeline stages, and application-release-management-pipeline-stage tasks and apply policies to configuration files to further specify the execution environments for application-release-management pipelines.