Calendar based management of information technology (IT) tasks

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10832224-B2
Application number	US-201514790020-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jul 2, 2015
Priority date	May 6, 2015
Publication date	Nov 10, 2020
Grant date	Nov 10, 2020

Abstract

Techniques for providing a calendar based provisioning and management for IT administrator/user activities in a virtual datacenter is described. In one example embodiment, an IT task is scheduled as a calendar appointment using an at least one registered calendar application residing in a user device. The at least one registered calendar application is then monitored for the scheduled IT task. The scheduled IT task is then translated into an action/command based on the outcome of the monitoring. The action/command is then issued to manage the scheduled IT task in the datacenter/cloud.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A method for calendar based management of IT (Information Technology) tasks in a datacenter, comprising:
registering, by a calendar based IT task management module residing in a management server, a calendar application residing in a user device using a calendar account, wherein the management server is to access the calendar application via a network;
enabling, by the calendar based IT task management module, to create a calendar appointment to schedule an IT task on a target machine in the datacenter using the registered calendar application residing in the user device, wherein the scheduled IT task comprises scheduling parameters selected from a group consisting of a start time, end time, start date, end date, IT task specific input, and future events;
establishing a connection, by the calendar based IT task management module, with the registered calendar application using authentication details and connection details of the calendar application;
monitoring, by the calendar based IT task management module, the registered calendar application according to a polling interval to fetch details of the calendar appointment upon establishing the connection;
translating, by the calendar based IT task management module, the scheduled IT task created as the calendar appointment in the registered calendar application into a command based on an outcome of the monitoring, comprising:
parsing and interpreting the scheduled IT task created as the calendar appointment in the registered calendar application from a subject line of the calendar appointment to generate a set of keywords;
mapping the set of keywords generated from the calendar appointment to a database of predefined keywords, wherein the database stein stores mapping information between the predefined keywords of domain specific language and actual system operations that perform the scheduled IT tasks; and
translating the set of keywords generated from the calendar appointment into the command that executes the actual system operations based on the mapping;

issuing the command to the datacenter for performing at least one of provisioning the IT task on the target machine and releasing the IT task on the target machine based on a lease period according to the created calendar appointment;
determining, by the calendar based IT task management module, whether the scheduled IT task is repetitive based on monitoring the calendar application and the future events; and
repetitively issuing the command associated with the scheduled IT task to the datacenter based on the outcome of the determination to automatically scale-in or scale-out datacenter resources.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the future events comprise at least one of the repetitive provisioning of the IT task and/l releasing the IT task based on the lease period to recover computing resources.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the datacenter is a cloud based virtual datacenter and the cloud is a private cloud, a public cloud, or a virtual cloud.

4. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium including instructions that when executed by a processor of a management server, cause the processor to:
register a calendar application residing in a user device using a calendar account, wherein the processor is to access the calendar application via a network;
enable to create a calendar appointment to schedule an IT task for a target machine in a datacenter using the registered calendar application residing in the user device, wherein the scheduled IT task comprises scheduling parameters selected from a group consisting of a start time, end time, start date, end date, IT task specific input, and future events;
establish a connection with the registered calendar application using authentication details and connection details of the calendar application;
monitor the registered calendar application according to a polling interval to fetch details of the calendar appointment upon establishing the connection;
translate the scheduled IT task created as the calendar appointment in the registered calendar application into a command based on an outcome of the monitoring, comprising:
parse and interpret the scheduled IT task created as the calendar appointment in the registered calendar application from a subject line of the calendar appointment to generate a set of keywords;
map the set of keywords generated from the calendar appointment to a database of predefined keywords, wherein the database stores mapping information between the predefined keywords of domain specific language and actual system operations that perform scheduled IT tasks; and
translate the set of keywords generated from the calendar appointment into the command that executes the actual system operations based on the mapping;
issue the command to the datacenter for performing at least one of provisioning the IT task on the target machine and release the IT task on the target machine based on a lease period according to the created calendar appointment;

determine whether the scheduled IT task is repetitive based on monitoring the calendar application and the future events; and
repetitively issue the command associated with the scheduled IT task to the datacenter based on the outcome of the determination to automatically scale-in or scale-out datacenter resources.

5. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 4 , wherein the future events comprise at least one of the repetitive provisioning of the IT task and/or releasing the IT task based on the lease period to recover computing resources.

6. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 4 , wherein the datacenter is a cloud based virtual datacenter and the cloud is a private cloud, a public cloud, or a virtual cloud.

7. A computing system for providing calendar based management for IT tasks in a virtual datacenter, the system comprising:
multiple host computing systems in the virtual datacenter, wherein each host computing system hosts multiple Virtual Machines (VMs);
a management server coupled to the virtual datacenter;
a network; and
one or more virtual IT infrastructure user devices coupled to the management server via a firewall and the network, wherein the management server comprises virtual management software (VMS), and wherein the VMS includes a calendar based IT task management module to:
register a calendar application residing in a user device using a calendar account, wherein the management server is to access the calendar application via the network;
enable to create a calendar appointment to schedule an IT task on a target machine in the virtual datacenter using the registered calendar application residing in the user device, wherein the scheduled IT task comprises scheduling parameters selected from a group consisting of a start time, end time, start date, end date, IT task specific input, and future events;
establish a connection with the registered calendar application using authentication details and connection details of the calendar application;
monitor the registered calendar application according to a polling interval to fetch details of the calendar appointment upon establishing the connection;
translate the scheduled IT task created as the calendar appointment in the registered calendar application into a command based on an outcome of the monitoring, comprising:
parse and interpret the scheduled IT task created as the calendar appointment in the registered calendar application from a subject line of the calendar appointment to generate a set of keywords;
map the set of keywords generated from the calendar appointment to a database of predefined keywords, wherein the database stores mapping information between the predefined keywords of domain

Assignees

• Vmware Inc

Inventors

• Palavalli Amarnath
• Kumar Saket
• Shrivastava Ankit
• Muneebuddin Mohammed
• Saha Mrityunjoy

Classifications

• G06Q10/1097 Primary

  using calendar-based scheduling for task assignment · CPC title

• G06Q10/06314

  Calendaring for a resource · CPC title

• H04L43/50

  Testing arrangements · CPC title

• G06F9/485

  Task life-cycle, e.g. stopping, restarting, resuming execution (G06F9/4881 takes precedence) · CPC title