Unified system lifecycle for components in an integrated software and hardware system

Abstract

An integrated software and hardware system is described that implements a unified lifecycle for the hardware and the software components therein. In the context of adding, removing or moving a hardware appliance, this allows the system to create, coordinate and manage a single lifecycle for each appliance together with its software processes, that is being moved or changed. The system includes a chassis with multiple enclosures for computing blades. Each blade in the chassis is assigned either a worker or bootstrap role. The worker blades perform the core processing of the service broker functionality and the bootstrap blades are used to provide the bootstrapping and administration of the worker blades. In particular, the administration features include an administration console that is provided by the bootstrap blade, which provides hardware management and process management.