Applications discovery based on file system directories

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2020183719-A1
Application number	US-201916280072-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Feb 20, 2019
Priority date	Dec 7, 2018
Publication date	Jun 11, 2020
Grant date	—

Abstract

Techniques for discovering applications based on file system directories are disclosed. In one example, process information may be extracted from a file system directory of an application host executing a plurality of applications. Further, an expression match may be performed on the process information. Furthermore, a presence of an application running on the application host may be determined based on an outcome of the expression match.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A method comprising:
extracting process information from a file system directory of an application host executing a plurality of applications; performing an expression match on the process information; and determining a presence of an application running on the application host based on an outcome of the expression match.

2 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
real-time monitoring the application; and determining health of the application based on the real-time monitoring.

3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the application host comprises a container running on a container host.

4 . The method of claim 3 , wherein extracting the process information from the file system directory comprises:
detecting a container identifier of the container running on the container host; determining a process identifier associated with a process running on the container based on the container identifier; determining the file system directory associated with the process identifier; and extracting the process information associated with the process running on the container from the file system directory.

5 . The method of claim 4 , wherein performing the expression match on the process information comprises:
determining command line parameters used to initiate the process using the process information; and performing the expression match on the command line parameters to determine the presence of the application.

6 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the application host is one of a physical server and a virtual machine.

7 . The method of claim 6 , wherein extracting the process information from the file system directory comprises:
determining a process identifier associated with a process running on the application host; determining the file system directory corresponding to the process identifier; and extracting the process information associated with the process running on the application host from the file system directory.

8 . The method of claim 7 , performing the expression match on the process information comprises:
determining command line parameters used to initiate the process using the process information; and performing the expression match on the command line parameters to determine the presence of the application.

9 . The method of claim 1 , wherein performing the expression match comprises performing a regular expression match.

10 . An apparatus comprising:
a container host implementing a container, the container executing a plurality of applications; a storage platform associated with the container host to store a plurality of file system directories associated with the plurality of applications and implementing storage resources for utilization by the container; and an application discovery unit residing in the container host to:
extract process information from a file system directory of the plurality of file system directories corresponding to the container;
perform an expression match on the process information; and
determine a presence of an application running on the container based on an outcome of the expression match.

11 . The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the container host comprises an application monitoring unit to:
real-time monitor the application running on the container to collect metrics corresponding to the application; and transmit the collected metrics to a cloud monitoring platform over a network, wherein cloud monitoring platform is to determine health of the application based on analyzing the collected metrics.

12 . The apparatus of claim 11 , wherein the container host comprises a processor resource coupled to a memory resource, and wherein the application discovery unit and the application monitoring unit are implemented by the processor executing instructions stored in the memory.

13 . The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the application discovery unit is to:
detect a container identifier of the container running on the container host; determine a process identifier associated with a process running on the container based on the container identifier; determine the file system directory associated with the process identifier; and extract the process information associated with the process running on the container from the file system directory.

14 . The apparatus of claim 13 , wherein the application discovery unit is to:
determine command line parameters used to initiate the process using the process information; and perform the expression match on the command line parameters to determine the presence of the application.

15 . The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the file system directory comprises information characterizing one or more parameters of a container operating environment of the container including one or more of a network parameter, a port parameter, a storage parameter, and a command line parameter.

16 . A non-transitory machine-readable storage medium encoded with instructions that, when executed by a processor of a container host, cause the processor to:
extract process information from a file system directory corresponding to a container executing a plurality of applications, the container running on the container host; perform an expression match on the process information; and determine a presence of an application running on the container based on an outcome of the expression match.

17 . The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 16 , further comprising instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to:
real-time monitor the application running on the container to collect metrics corresponding to the application; and transmit the collected metrics to a cloud monitoring platform over a network, wherein cloud monitoring platform is to determine health of the application based on analyzing the collected metrics.

18 . The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 16 , wherein instructions to extract the process information from the file system directory comprises instructions to:
detect a container identifier of the container running on the container host; determine a process identifier associated with a process running on the container based on the container identifier; determine the file system directory associated with the process identifier; and extract the process information associated with the process running on the container from the file system directory.

19 . The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 18 , wherein instructions to perform the expression match on the process information comprises instructions to:
determine command line parameters used to initiate the process using the process information; and perform the expression match on the command line parameters to determine the presence of the application.

20 . The non-transitory machine-readable storage medium of claim 16 , wherein instructions to perform the expression match comprises instructions to perform a regular expression match.

Assignees

• Vmware Inc

Inventors

• Shetty Divith
• Chaudhary Vipul
• Vivekananda Vinay

Classifications

• G06F2009/45579

  I/O management, e.g. providing access to device drivers or storage · CPC title

• G06F9/45558

  Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects · CPC title

• G06F8/60 Primary

  Software deployment · CPC title

• G06F9/45545 Primary

  Guest-host, i.e. hypervisor is an application program itself, e.g. VirtualBox · CPC title

• G06F16/90344

  by using string matching techniques · CPC title