International Business Machines Corporation

Rodney Alan Little

Jeffrey Alan Frey

Gary Stuart Puchkoff

Geoffrey Martin Hambrick

Robert Howard High, Jr

Sridhar Sudarsan

Carroll Eugene Fulkerson, Jr

Leho Nigul

Jeffrey David Aman

Theodore R Maeurer

Nancy P Riggs

Software configuration information and topological information associated with a group of software program instances installed on at least one computing device are tracked. An available software update is identified for at least one of the group of software program instances. At least one software update suggestion rule that specifies a target software configuration and a target topological dependency to which the available software update applies is evaluated against the tracked software configuration information and topological information. A determination is made as to whether the available software update is targeted to the tracked software configuration information and topological information based upon the evaluation of the at least one software update suggestion rule. A notification of the available software update is provided in response to determining that the available software update is targeted to the tracked software configuration information and topological information.

Software service notifications based upon software usage, configuration, and deployment topology

An improved method, apparatus, and computer instructions for creating and running batch jobs in an object oriented environment, such as a J2EE environment. A request to execute a batch job is received. A deployment descriptor file is processed to identify a batch bean to be invoked. This batch job session bean processes the request, parses deployment descriptor file that comprises definitions of relationships between other helper classes, entity and session beans. The identified batch bean is invoked to execute the batch job step in the order described in the deployment descriptor applying checkpoints at intervals specified in the descriptor.

Implementing container managed batch jobs in an enterprise java bean environment

A batch component model is provided within a distributed object environment. The batch component is designed to capture the iterative logic of a batch program as it reads from one or more input streams, invokes operations on other business component functions, and generates output to one or more output streams. Deployment descriptors express declarative policies for the component that will influence how the component is managed including the streams it uses, business components it depends on, how processing costs are accounted, and the resource demands the job will put on the system. Input streams and output streams are encapsulated in objects that hide the actual source of input and output data so that the component can be redeployed in different execution environments to different physical data sources without requiring the program to be changed. A batch container enforces the deployment policies declared for the batch component.

Component model for batch computing in a distributed object environment

A method, apparatus, and computer instructions are provided for implementing container managed uses, ownerships, and references in an enterprise JavaBean&#x2122; environment. A user may specify a uses, ownership, reference relationships between entity beans and sessions in a deployment descriptor file. When the file is processed, the present embodiment generates methods on the entity beans and allows the container to recognize the relationships, such that the user may access the session beans based on the specified relationships.

Apparatus for implementing container managed uses, ownerships, and references in an enterprise javabean environment

Method and apparatus for implementing container managed uses, ownerships, and references in an enterprise JavaBean environment

A server instance includes a first region to perform one or more privileged functions and a second region to perform one or more non-privileged functions. Thus, the privileged functions are separate from the non-privileged functions. The first region includes at least a portion of an object request broker, which is used in communicating with one or more clients coupled to the server instance. The second region executes non-privileged application code, and can be replicated within the server instance based on workload management criteria.

Separating privileged functions from non-privileged functions in a server instance

A set of management policies, selectable by the customer at object installation time, is used to manage one or more instances of an object. The set of policies includes at least one of an activation isolation policy, a passivation policy, a flush policy, and a refresh policy. The policies are managed by one or more containers of the computing environment.

Employing management policies to manage instances of objects

Management functions typically performed by containers of a server instance are delegated to resource managers coupled to the server instance. For example, responsibility for such management functions as locking, security control, multisystem caching and commitment control are removed from the containers and delegated to the resource managers. This enables ongoing improvements and functional extensions provided in the underlying resource managers to be immediately leveraged transparently in the server instance.

Delegating instance management functions to underlying resource managers

A composed business object of a server instance is provided. The server instance is coupled to a plurality of resource managers using a container of the server instance. A data object corresponding to the business object is populated with data retrieved using the plurality of resource managers. Thus, a business object is composed of data from multiple and/or diverse resource managers using a single container.

Providing composed containers and data objects to support multiple resources

Workload management of a computing environment is facilitated. A location service agent located within a server instance of the computing environment is used to facilitate workload management of the computing environment. The location service agent receives a request for an object of the computing environment. The location service agent then requests a workload manager of the server instance to determine which server instance of a plurality of server instances is to handle the request. The request is forwarded to the selected server instance using a direct reference.

Facilitating workload management by using a location forwarding capability

An object factory is registered under multiple interface names. The interface names have an inheritance relationship with an object implementation associated with the object factory. The names are registered in a repository of a name space, such as a Life Cycle Repository. Thus, an object factory can be located using any one of the interface names.

Growing community of inventors

Poughkeepsie, NY, United States of America

Rodney Alan Little