Flow engine for building automated flows within a cloud based developmental platform

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10534337-B2
Application number	US-201715587075-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	May 4, 2017
Priority date	May 4, 2017
Publication date	Jan 14, 2020
Grant date	Jan 14, 2020

Abstract

Creating and executing flow plans by performing at least the following: obtaining a run-time flow plan that comprises a trigger, a first operation, and a second operation, wherein the first operation precedes the second operation within the run-time flow plan and one or more input values of the second operation are linked to the first operation, determining whether one or more conditions of the trigger are met, execute the first operation based at least on the determination that the one or more conditions of the trigger are met, monitoring whether the second operation is ready for execution based at least on a determination that the one or more input values of a second action operation are ready, and executing the second action operation when the second action operation has been identified as ready for execution.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A system comprising:
a non-transitory memory; and
one or more hardware processors configured to read instructions from the non-transitory memory to cause the system to:
obtain a run-time flow plan that comprises a trigger, a first operation, and a second operation, wherein the first operation precedes the second operation within the run-time flow plan and one or more input values of the second operation are linked to the first operation;
determine whether one or more conditions of the trigger are met;
execute the first operation based at least on the determination that the one or more conditions of the trigger are met;
monitor whether the second operation is ready for execution based at least on:
determining whether the one or more input values of the second operation are ready, wherein the one or more input values are ready after the first operation has executed; and
determining whether one or more operational conditions associated with the second operation are sufficient to execute the second operation;

transmit the second operation and the one or more input values to a management, instrumentation, and discovery (MID) server via an external communication channel (ECC) queue in response to determining that the one or more input values are ready and the one or more operational conditions are insufficient to execute the second operation, wherein the MID server is configured to execute the second operation in response to receiving the second operation and the one or more input values; and
receive one or more output values associated with the second operation from the MID server via the ECC queue.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the instructions cause the system to:
receive an action flow plan that comprises a plurality of actions, wherein each action comprises an action step; and
convert the action flow plan into the run-time flow plan, wherein each action step of each action is converted to an action step operation.

3. The system of claim 2 , wherein the first operation is an action step operation.

4. The system of claim 2 , wherein the action flow plan is represented as a data model within a configuration management database.

5. The system of claim 1 , wherein a global state is not used to monitor whether the second operation is ready for execution.

6. The system of claim 1 , wherein the instructions cause the system to monitor whether the second operation is ready for execution based at least on determining whether the one or more input values of the second operation are ready, determining whether the one or more operational conditions associated with the second operation are sufficient to execute the second operation, and determining whether a third operation within the run-time flow plan has completed execution.

7. The system of claim 1 , wherein the first operation is a first action start directive operation and the second operation is a second action start directive operation.

8. The system of claim 1 , wherein the run-time flow plan comprises a third operation that is linked to the one or more output values associated with the second operation.

9. A method comprising:
obtaining a run-time flow plan that comprises a trigger, a first operation, and a second operation, wherein the first operation precedes the second operation within the run-time flow plan and one or more input values of the second operation are linked to the first operation;
determining whether one or more conditions of the trigger are met;
executing the first operation based at least on the determination that the one or more conditions of the trigger are met;
monitoring whether the second operation is ready for execution based at least on:
determining whether the one or more input values of the second operation are ready, wherein the one or more input values are ready after the first operation has executed; and
determining whether one or more operational conditions associated with the second operation are sufficient to execute the second operation;

transmitting the second operation and the one or more input values to a management, instrumentation, and discovery (MID) server via an external communication channel (ECC) queue in response to determining that the one or more input values are ready and the one or more operational conditions are sufficient to execute the second operation, wherein the MID server is configured to execute the second operation in response to receiving the second operation and the one or more input values; and
receiving one or more output values associated with the second operation from the MID server via the ECC queue.

10. The method of claim 9 , comprising:
receiving an action flow plan that comprises a plurality of actions, wherein each action comprises an action step; and
converting the action flow plan into the run-time flow plan, wherein each action step of each action is converted to an action step operation.

11. The method of claim 10 , wherein the action flow plan is represented as a data model within a configuration management database.

12. The method of claim 9 , wherein a global state is not used to monitor whether the second operation is ready for execution.

13. The method of claim 9 , wherein the first operation is a first action start directive operation and the second operation is a second action start directive operation.

14. The method of claim 9 , wherein the run-time flow plan comprises a third operation that is linked to the one or more output values associated with the second operation.

15. A system comprising:
at least one user interface;
a non-transitory memory; and
one or more hardware processors configured to read instructions from the non-transitory memory to cause the system to perform operations comprising:
creating a trigger for an action flow plan that activates when one or more computing conditions are met;
defining a plurality of actions for the action flow plan that would execute after the trigger activates, wherein each of the plurality of actions comprises a respective sequence of action steps associated with respective inputs and outputs;
receiving from the at least one user interface an instruction to publish the action flow plan;
converting, via a flow plan builder, the action flow plan into a run-time flow plan for execution, wherein each action step is converted to an operation and the execution of the run-time flow plan comprises:
executing a first operation based at least on determining that the one or more computing conditions of the trigger are met;
monitoring whether a second operation is ready for execution based at least on:
determining whether one or more input values of the second operation are ready, wherein the one or more input values are ready after the first operation has executed; and
determining whether one or more operational conditions associated with the second operation are sufficient to execute the second operation;

transmitting the second operation and the one or more input values to a management, instrumentation, and discovery (MID) server via an external communication channel (ECC) queue in response to determining that the one or more input values are ready and the one or more operational conditions are insufficient to execute the second operation, wherein the MID server is configured to execute the second operation in response to receiving the second operation and the one or more input values; and
receiving one or more output values associated with the second operation from the MID server via the ECC queue.

16. The system of claim 15 , wherein the action flow plan is

Assignees

• Servicenow Inc

Inventors

• Tucker Christopher
• Nelson Harry Thomas
• Sarbora Russell Samuel

Classifications

• G06Q10/0633 Primary

  Workflow analysis · CPC title

• H04L67/00

  Network arrangements or protocols for supporting network services or applications (user-to-user messaging H04L51/00; network arrangements, protocols or services for supporting real-time applications in data packet communications networks H04L65/00) · CPC title

• H04L67/10

  in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network (software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46) · CPC title

• G05B19/0426 Primary

  Programming the control sequence · CPC title

• G05B2219/2642

  Domotique, domestic, home control, automation, smart house · CPC title