Nortel Networks Corporation

Johnson T Kuruvila

Rod Story

Bill W Gage

Michael H Diec

A software sparing process and apparatus to reduce the likelihood of software failures is provided. Software sparing provides software entities, called spares, which take over and provide similar functionality as the failed system to the clients of the failed entity. They also permit the introduction of new software versions with no loss in service during the switch over period. These spare entities, which may be located on different nodes in a system, communicate using a standard interface protocol. Sparing is done at the software 'chunk' level instead of at the hardware box level, which is the common practice, resulting in lower costs and improved reliability. A computer readable storage medium containing a program element to direct a processor of a computer to implement the software sparing process described earlier is also provided.

Process and apparatus for reducing software failures using sparing in

The invention relates to a process and apparatus for tracing software entities, more particularly a tracing tool providing tracing capabilities to entities in an application. The object-tracing tool provides software components to allow tracing the execution of an application. Tracing software entities is important for software developers to permit the quick localization of errors and hence facilitate the debugging process. It is also useful for the software user who wishes to view the control flow and perhaps add some modifications to the software. Traditionally, software-tracing tools have been confined to single node systems where all the components of an application run on a single machine. The novel tracing tool presented in this application provides a method and an apparatus for tracing software entities in a distributed computing environment. This is done by using a network management entity to keep track of the location of the entities in the system and by using a library of modules that can be inherited to provide tracing capabilities. It also uses a log file to allow the program developer or user to examine the flow, the occurrence of events during a trace and the values of designated attributes. The invention also provides a computer readable storage medium containing a program element to direct a processor of a computer to implement the software tracing process.

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Nepean, Canada

Johnson T Kuruvila