Creation of a graph database of a virtualization infrastructure

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9460187-B2
Application number	US-201313912358-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jun 7, 2013
Priority date	Jun 7, 2013
Publication date	Oct 4, 2016
Grant date	Oct 4, 2016

Abstract

In a computer-implemented method for creating a graph database of a virtualization infrastructure, data defining entities and relationships of the entities of a virtualization infrastructure is received at a graph database, wherein the relationships of the entities are in accordance with an inventory structure of the virtualization infrastructure. The graph database is populated with the entities and the relationships of the entities of the virtualization infrastructure.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A computer-implemented method for creating a graph database of a virtualization infrastructure, the method comprising:
receiving data defining entities and relationships of the entities of a virtualization infrastructure at the graph database, wherein the relationships of the entities are in accordance with an inventory structure of the virtualization infrastructure;
creating a social network of identified members of the virtualization infrastructure based on the relationships of the entities of the virtualization infrastructure, wherein the virtualization infrastructure is mapped into the social network comprising human members and non-human members, wherein the non-human members of the social network comprise components of the virtualization infrastructure, and wherein the components of the virtualization infrastructure comprise a host computing system and a virtual machine hosted by the host computing system, wherein the relationships of the entities correspond to relationships of the social network, and wherein the relationships of the social network correspond to a communication connection between members of the social network;
establishing affiliation relationships within the social network between identified members of the virtualization infrastructure based on the relationships of the entities;
populating the graph database with the entities and the relationships of the entities of the virtualization infrastructure, the graph database comprising nodes associated with the members of the virtualization infrastructure and edges associated with the relationships of the members of the virtualization infrastructure, wherein the relationships of the members are in accordance with the inventory structure of the virtualization infrastructure, and wherein the nodes and the relationships within the graph database comprise types, wherein the graph database is configured to receive a query to the graph database and to transmit an answer to the query over the social network; and
responsive to detecting a change in the inventory structure of the virtualization infrastructure, updating the graph database to reflect the change in the inventory structure of the virtualization infrastructure.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the populating the graph database comprises: associating the entities with nodes of the graph database; and associating the relationships of the entities with edges between the nodes of the graph database.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 2 wherein the populating the graph database further comprises: assigning types to the nodes and the relationships within the graph database.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the entities of the virtualization infrastructure comprise: a system administrator; a virtualization management server; a plurality of hosts; a plurality of virtual machines; and a datacenter.

5. A computer-implemented method for creating a graph database of a virtualization infrastructure, the method comprising:
receiving data from a social network of a virtualization infrastructure at the graph database, wherein the social network is of identified members of the virtualization infrastructure based on relationships of entities of the virtualization infrastructure, the social network comprising affiliation relationships between the identified members of the virtualization infrastructure based on the relationships of the identified members, the wherein the virtualization infrastructure is mapped into the social network comprising human members and non-human members, wherein the non-human members of the social network comprise components of the virtualization infrastructure, and wherein the components of the virtualization infrastructure comprise a host computing system, a virtual machine hosted by the host computing system, the data defining members and relationships of the social network, wherein the members of the social network correspond to entities of the virtualization infrastructure and the relationships of the members of the social network correspond to relationships of the entities of the virtualization infrastructure and wherein the relationships of the members are in accordance with an inventory structure of the virtualization infrastructure, and wherein the relationships of the social network correspond to a communication connection between members of the social network;
populating the graph database with the members and the relationships of the social network of the virtualization infrastructure, the graph database comprising nodes associated with the members of the virtualization infrastructure and edges associated with the relationships of the members of the virtualization infrastructure, and wherein the nodes and the relationships within the graph database comprise types, wherein the graph database is configured to receive a query to the graph database and to transmit an answer to the query over the social network; and
responsive to detecting a change in the inventory structure of the virtualization infrastructure, updating the graph database to reflect the change in the inventory structure of the virtualization infrastructure.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 5 , wherein the populating the graph database comprises: associating the members of the social network with nodes of the graph database; and associating the relationships of the social network with edges between the nodes of the graph database.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 6 wherein the populating the graph database further comprises: assigning types to the nodes and the relationships within the graph database.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 5 , wherein the members comprise users corresponding to the entities of the virtualization infrastructure and groups of users.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 8 , wherein the entities of the virtualization infrastructure comprise: a system administrator; a virtualization management server; a plurality of hosts; and a plurality of virtual machines.

10. The computer-implemented method of claim 9 , wherein the entities of the virtualization infrastructure further comprise: a datacenter, wherein the datacenter represents a group of hosts of the plurality of hosts.

11. The computer-implemented method of claim 5 , further comprising: determining the inventory structure of the virtualization infrastructure; associating entities of the virtualization infrastructure with the members of the social network; and creating the relationships of the social network among the members of the social network in accordance with the inventory structure.

12. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium having computer-readable program code stored thereon for causing a computer system to perform a method for creating a graph database of a virtualization infrastructure, the method comprising:
determining an inventory structure of the virtualization infrastructure, wherein components of the virtualization infrastructure comprise a host computing system and a virtual machine hosted by the host computing system;
creating a social network of identified members of the virtualization infrastructure based on relationships of entities of the virtualization infrastructure the members of the virtualization infrastructure comprising human members and non-human members, wherein the non-human members of the social network comprise the components of the virtualization infrastructure;
creating relationships among the members of the social network in accordance with the inventory structure, wherein the relationships of the social network correspond to a communication con

Assignees

• Vmware Inc

Inventors

• Soundararajan Vijayaraghavan
• Spracklen Lawrence

Classifications

• G06F16/28 Primary

  Databases characterised by their database models, e.g. relational or object models · CPC title

• G06F17/30587 Primary

  Physics · mapped topic