Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput – Computer-to-computer data routing – Least weight routing
Reexamination Certificate
1998-12-04
2001-10-09
Harrell, Robert B. (Department: 2152)
Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput
Computer-to-computer data routing
Least weight routing
Reexamination Certificate
active
06301624
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to computer network architectures, and, more specifically, to software for managing computer and communications networks. More particularly, the present invention provides software, systems and apparatus -for managing software and hardware entities over a computer network. The present invention has applications in the areas of computer science, computer network management, and computer software.
2. The Related Art
The demands on computer network managers have grown exponentially as the size and extensiveness of computer networks has grown over the past decade. Starting from the relatively simple task of maintaining communication among a relatively small number of mainframe computers, network managers must now coordinate operations among thousands of computers, printers, servers, and other networked devices. With the advent of the Java® and Jini™ programming languages, even household devices will soon become linked over computer networks running on household “intranets” that in turn are linked to the worldwide Internet. Thus, there appears to be no end in sight to the increasing burden on network managers.
To control and coordinate the software associated with the myriad of networked computers and other devices, network managers employ software designed to track, establish communications with, and control various software entities or processes that exist independently or represent the networked devices. Entities that represent networked devices are also referred to herein as “agents”. The software used by the network manager interacts with various “platform-level” software services to enable the network manager to locate and interact with the various entities running on the network. Typically all communications between the network manager and the entities running on the network, as well as communications between entities, are managed by a central service.
The entities on the network can communicate among each other and the network manager by sending and receiving messages. Messages can be requests, responses, or events. In particular, some events may be alarms (e.g., a warning of a communications failure or other error state). Generally, when a device or software entity on the network is in an error state it sends a stream of alarms to the network management software indicating the error state. The network management software processes and logs the alarms. However, the volume of alarms processed by the network management software can be great for large computer networks even when few or no error messages are being generated. This volume can slow system performance dramatically and in certain situations may create a processing bottleneck sufficient to cause one or more network management components to fail. Such decreased performance and risks are not acceptable for large-scale networks that must be available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.
Therefore, it would be beneficial to provide systems, methods, and software for a computer network management architecture such that large numbers of events can be processed, and the network will perform acceptably even if a central piece of the network management software fails. The present invention meets these and other needs
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention meets the above-described needs by providing, in one aspect, an event processing facility for computer and communications network management architectures that is robust under heavy event processing loads. The design of the event handling software, system, and methods provided by the present invention avoids failures under heavy event processing loads by providing overload controls. Such a capability reduces the risk of a catastrophic network management failure.
In one aspect, the present invention provides a method for processing events generated by software and hardware entities installed on a computer network. In one embodiment, the method of the invention includes the steps of providing a protocol translation facility that is configured to translate messages from a first network communications protocol to a second network communications protocol. The protocol translation facility is further configured to receive events transmitted by software and hardware entities on the network. The protocol translation facility forwards the events to a management information server. An event is received, and a determination is made whether an association between the protocol translation facility and the entity exists. The event is processed.
In a more particular embodiment, the method of the invention includes receiving a request for an association from an entity if the entity is not associated with a protocol translation facility. A determination is then made whether the protocol translation facility has exceeded a threshold. In a still more particular embodiment, the protocol translation facility performs this determination. In other embodiments, a threshold determination is performed for each entity associated with a protocol translation facility. In still other embodiments, requests for new associations are denied if the threshold is exceeded. In yet other embodiments, if the threshold is exceeded, then existing associations are terminated as well.
According to one embodiment of the invention, the determination whether an event threshold has been exceeded is made by determining an event rate. The event rate is compared with the threshold, and a determination is made whether the threshold is exceeded. If the threshold has been exceeded, then a determination is made whether to abort all associations between the protocol translation facility and the entities associated with the protocol translation facility.
In another aspect, the present invention includes a system for processing events generated by entities installed on a computer network. In one embodiment, the system provided by the invention includes a protocol translation facility configured to receive and process events. The protocol translation facility is coupled with an entity configured to transmit events. An association management facility is also coupled with the protocol translation facility. The association management facility is configured to determine whether a threshold of the protocol translation facility has been exceeded. If the threshold has been exceeded, the association management facility terminates existing associations between the entity and the protocol translation facility.
In a more particular embodiment, the system provided by the present invention further includes a notification facility configured to determine whether notification is provided to a management information service if said event-processing limit is exceeded. A still more particular embodiment includes an association abort facility that determines whether the threshold is exceeded. The abort facility is configured to determine an event rate and compare the event rate to entries in a overload control table.
In other aspects, the present invention includes computer-readable medium containing computer-readable and data signals configured to provide a protocol translation facility configured to translate messages from a first network communications protocol to a second network communications protocol. The protocol translation facility is further configured to receive events transmitted to the protocol translation facility from entities corresponding to the software and hardware entities and forward the events to a management information server. The software encoded on the computer-readable medium further is configured to receive an event from an entity corresponding to the software or hardware entity installed on said computer network, determine whether an association between the entity and the protocol translation facility exists, and process the event.
REFERENCES:
patent: 6128315 (2000-10-01), Takeuchi et al.
Angal Rajeev
Bapat Subodh
Lee Linda
Beyer Weaver & Thomas LLP
Harrell Robert B.
Sun Microsystems Inc.
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