Sun Microsystems, Inc.

Alan J Treece

Matthew Helgren

Paris E Bingham, Jr

Rex G Martin

Mike E Little

Michael E Little

Matt J Helgren

A knowledge automation engine used to detect product issues on products. A knowledge automation engine may evaluate a check against one or more facts to detect a product issue. Facts used by the knowledge automation engine may include product configuration facts. A check may include one or more rules and reference one or more product check matrixes of facts, such as, but not limited to, identifiers for product packages and patches to be used by a check. As packages and/or patches become available for a product, they may be added to a product check matrix for the product. The packages and patches may be added to the database using predefined associations. The check may use the product check matrix to update packages and/or patches (including adding new packages/patches and removing old packages/patches) on a product accessible by the knowledge automation engine.

Product check matrix

Fact collection for a knowledge automation engine to use in detecting product issues on products. A knowledge automation engine may evaluate a check against a fact to detect a product issue on a product and provide a user of the product remediation information. A check may contain a product issue description, a rule to evaluate against a fact in order to detect the product issue, and remediation information to help a user address the product issue if the product issue is detected on the product. Product issues may include product installation validation and known product bugs. Facts used by the knowledge automation engine may include product configuration facts. Static facts may be collected into a fact repository. A fact collector may be used to collect facts not found in the fact repository but needed to execute checks on the knowledge automation engine.

Fact collection for product knowledge management

A system for creating and editing checks for a knowledge automation engine to use in detecting product issues on products. A knowledge automation engine may evaluate a check against a fact to detect a product issue on a product and provide a client of the product remediation information. A check may contain a product issue description, a rule to evaluate against a fact in order to detect the product issue, and remediation information to help a client address the product issue if the product issue is detected on the product. Product issues may include product installation validation and known product bugs. Facts used by the knowledge automation engine may include product configuration facts. Statistics on check execution results may be accumulated to provide additional information on products through their life cycle.

Product knowledge management

A system for creating and editing checks for a knowledge automation engine to use in detecting product issues on products. A knowledge automation engine may evaluate a check against a fact to detect a product issue on a product and provide a user of the product remediation information. A check may contain a product issue description, a rule to evaluate against a fact in order to detect the product issue, and remediation information to help a user address the product issue if the product issue is detected on the product. Product issues may include product installation validation and known product bugs. Facts used by the knowledge automation engine may include product configuration facts. Checks may be created and edited using a standard interface.

Check creation and maintenance for product knowledge management

A check for a knowledge automation engine to use in detecting product issues on products. A knowledge automation engine may evaluate a check against a fact to detect a product issue on a product and provide a user of the product remediation information. A check may contain a product issue description, a rule to evaluate against a fact in order to detect the product issue, and remediation information to help a user address the product issue if the product issue is detected on the product. Product issues may include product installation validation and known product bugs. Facts used by the knowledge automation engine may include product configuration facts.

Checks for product knowledge management

A system and method for identifying problems with a system configuration may evaluate system configuration information against one or more configuration recommendations or rules. The evaluated system configuration may include various types of software and hardware components which may impact the operations of the computer system. Rules may be any information identifying an issue or describing a recommended configuration for the software or hardware component. A knowledge-based language or a programming language analyzer may be used to specify the rules. In one embodiment, a rules engine may be used as part of the problem detection application to evaluate configuration data against associated rules. A rules engine may be any mechanism used to recognize, interpret and process the configuration data against the rules. The results of the evaluation process may be stored for further analysis.

Rules-based configuration problem detection

The present invention provides an automated problem identification system. The invention analyzes a customer's computing environment, including administration practices, system configuration including hardware, software and the operating system. Then the invention compares the computing environment to an internal rules database. The internal rules database is a compilation of various problems that are known to exist on various configurations. Then, instead of calling an expert when there is a problem and repeating the process for every customer, the invention uses a proactive approach by analyzing a given system configuration and comparing it to a body of known problems, before the system breaks down.

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St. Peters, MO, United States of America

Alan J Treece