Patent Application
20140222989
This disclosure relates to tools (such as systems, apparatuses, methodologies, computer program products, etc.) for managing information technology devices, and more particularly, such tools for managing device management units in a network.
In the current information age, information technology (IT) assets (e.g., hardware, software, database, etc.) are extensively used in enterprises and other organizations in order to facilitate processing of documents and data and to allow users to access other functionalities and devices (such as computers, printers, scanners, multi-function devices (MFDs) and other network-connected or standalone devices, etc). However, while there have been many technical advances, IT systems are not yet fully automated and capable of self-maintenance, without human intervention. Thus, in each IT system, one or more IT administrators typically monitor and manage the devices in the system.
Device management tools (such as application software, etc.) are available to enable the administrators to track, monitor and otherwise manage the devices from remotely. For example,
However, the number of networked devices that must be managed is generally increasing and the typical IT administrator is required to oversee a growing number of IT assets. Since management tools, such as the management apparatus 101 illustrated in
There exists a need for an improved system for managing IT devices.
Various tools (for example, a system, an apparatus, application software, etc.) can be provided to help an information technology (IT) administrator with management of IT assets in an IT system.
In an aspect of this disclosure, a core management unit monitors one or more device management units that manage devices in a network system. The core management unit registers, for each particular device management unit amongst the one or more device management units, a network address and authentication information specific to the particular device management unit and obtained in an installation process installing the particular device management unit on a corresponding host computer.
In another aspect, when a device management unit is uninstalled from the corresponding host computer, a core management unit obtains setting information of the particular device management unit and device information maintained by the particular device management unit from the particular device management unit, and stores the obtained setting information and device information in a storage unit. The stored setting information is employed to reinstall the particular device management unit on another host computer, without having a user specify settings for reinstalling the particular device management unit on said another host computer.
In another aspect, a core management unit registers a particular device management unit in a device management registry, and when the particular device management unit is uninstalled from a host computer, the core management unit unregisters the particular device management unit from the device management registry, but continues to store the setting information and the device information obtained from the particular device management unit. When the particular device management unit is reinstalled on another host computer, the core management unit causes the stored device information to be uploaded to the particular device management unit reinstalled on said another host computer.
In another aspect, a core management unit maintains, for each specific device amongst various network devices in the system, device management data that includes device assignment data associating the specific device with a specific device management unit assigned to manage the specific device. The core management unit modifies the device assignment data of the specific device to reassign management of the specific device from the specific device management unit to another device management unit.
In another aspect, when a particular device management unit is inactive or unavailable for at least a predetermined period of time, the core management unit automatically modifies the device management data of each particular device amongst one or more particular devices assigned to be managed by the particular device management unit, to associate the particular device with another device management unit for managing said particular device.
In another aspect, a core management part assigns to a particular device management unit a management unit name, and the management unit name is registered in association with the particular device management unit in a registry of the device management units. When the particular device management unit is reinstalled on said another host computer, the core management unit automatically registers the particular device management unit in the registry once again using the same management unit name.
In another aspect, the core management unit communicates with a license management device external to the core management unit and registers the particular device management unit in association with a network address of the core management unit, with the license management device.
The aforementioned and other aspects, features and advantages can be more readily understood from the following detailed description with reference to the accompanying drawings wherein:
In describing preferred embodiments illustrated in the drawings, specific terminology is employed for the sake of clarity. However, the disclosure of this patent specification is not intended to be limited to the specific terminology so selected and it is to be understood that each specific element includes all technical equivalents that operate in a similar manner. In addition, a detailed description of known functions and configurations will be omitted when it may obscure the subject matter of the present invention.
Referring now to the drawings, wherein like reference numerals designate identical or corresponding parts throughout the several views, there is described tools (systems, apparatuses, methodologies, computer program products, etc.) for managing information technology devices, such as computers, printers, scanners, multi-function devices, and other network-connected, or standalone, devices (such as a projector unit, a video conference device, a telephone conference device, a shredding device, a stamp device, etc.), and for managing one or more networks to which a plurality of such information technology devices are connected.
For example,
The devices 201A-203A and 201B-203B may include, for example, a printer, a scanner, a terminal and/or a multi-function device (MFD). While this example of this disclosure simply refers to devices 201A-203A and 201B-203B in the interest of brevity, the aspects of this disclosure are applicable to a network environment having an arbitrary number of devices. An exemplary configuration a network device as an MFD is described infra with reference to
The device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1, each of which are implemented on the corresponding host apparatus, are configured to manage and collect device data from the devices in the system 200. In particular, each of the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 may be responsible for managing and collecting data from a subset of the devices in the system 200. For example, as shown in
An example of device data collected by the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 from the devices 201A-203A and 201B-203B is illustrated in
The device data collected by the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 may also include error history information that includes a log of all errors occurring at the corresponding managed device, and usage history information indicating which users have the utilized the managed device and when such use has occurred. The usage history information may indicate, for example, a number of total impressions (e.g. pages) produced by a user, or a number of specific types of impressions (copy color, copy BW, print color, print BW, etc.) produced by a user.
The device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 communicate with one or more of the plurality of network-connected devices to collect and obtain the various device data corresponding to each device. Many printers and other devices store data indicating their attributes or properties in a Management Information Base (MIB). The MIB may conform with the SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol) protocol, and properties information can be obtained directly from the MIB through SNMP queries. In this way, the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 are configured to discover and/or poll the corresponding plurality of network devices to obtain the device data from the network devices.
The device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 may obtain the device data (such as the name, status, configuration information, error history, usage history, etc.) from each network device by monitoring a network to which the device is connected (i.e. networks 205), and detecting and receiving one or more alert notifications or status updates transmitted to the network from any of the plurality of network-connected devices 201-203. For example, the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 may receive the status updates by repeatedly transmitting requests to the network-connected devices 201-203 via the networks 205, inquiring as to the status of each network device. In response, each network device may transmit status updates back to the corresponding device management unit, wherein each status update indicates the device name, status, configuration information, error history, usage history, whether an error exists or has occurred at the network device, etc. Alternatively, each network-connected device may automatically transmit status updates to the corresponding device management unit (without waiting for requests or queries from the device management unit), at regular intervals or whenever an error occurs at the network-connected device. The device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 may include locally resident hardware and/or software agents installed locally on each of the devices 201-203, which are configured to transmit the status updates directly to the corresponding device management unit. The device data may be stored along with other data in one or more storage units external to the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1, or alternatively, in one or more storage units resident in the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 and retrieved as needed.
Referring back to
Although the networks 205A, 205B and 209 are illustrated as being separate networks, the system 200 is not limited to such configuration, and any of the networks shown in
Also, how the core management apparatus 206, host apparatuses 204 and terminal 207 are connected is not limited to the configuration shown in
Each of the core management unit 251 and the device management units 252-255 may be implemented on a host computer, a network device (e.g. MFD), a terminal, or any other device including a processor and a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium.
For example, systemic changes to devices (e.g. changes to be made to all devices or all devices of the same type) may be configured via the core management unit (e.g. on a core management apparatus) by a super administrator who oversees the entire network environment, since the core management unit is connected to all the devices in the network environment, either directly or indirectly. On the other hand, the device management units only manage a subset of the devices in the network environment. Thus, a local administrator at a regional office of the enterprise may configure devices within the local network (e.g. devices 254A-254C via the device management unit 254). The configuration of the system 250 is not limited to the example illustrated in
As shown in
The core management unit 206a monitors the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 and registers for each particular device management unit of the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 a network address and authentication information specific to the particular device management. Such network address and authentication information is obtained during the installation process for installing the particular device management unit on a corresponding host computer.
When the particular device management unit is uninstalled from the corresponding host computer, setting information of the particular device management unit and device information maintained by the particular device management unit are obtained from the particular device management unit, received through the network communication unit 206c, and stored in the information storing unit 206b.
When the particular device management is to be reinstalled on another host computer, the setting information stored by the information storing unit 206b is communicated through the network communication unit 206c and employed to reinstall the particular device management unit on said another host computer. Thus, instead of the user reinstalling the particular device management unit having to specify settings for the particular device management unit, the setting information that the particular device management unit requires in order to function properly is automatically retrieved from the core management apparatus 206.
In another exemplary embodiment, the core management unit 206a communicates with the particular device management unit being installed
Thus, even if the device management unit is being installed for the first time, settings of the device management unit can automatically be configured user intervention.
In another exemplary embodiment, the core management unit 206a registers each device management unit in a device management registry which lists each of the device management units registered with the core management unit.
As shown in
Further, the device information table of
The setting information stored by the core management unit is not limited to that shown in
The tables shown in
Referring back to
The core management unit 206a and/or the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 may include a data store that can comprise one or more structural or functional parts that have or support a storage function. For example, the data store can be, or can be a component of, a source of electronic data, such as a document access apparatus, a backend server connected to a document access apparatus, an e-mail server, a file server, a multi-function peripheral device (MFP or MFD), a voice data server, an application server, a computer, a network apparatus, a terminal etc. It should be appreciated that the term “electronic document” or “electronic data”, as used herein, in its broadest sense, can comprise any data that a user may wish to access, retrieve, review, etc.
As an example, the core management unit 206a (or the core management apparatus 206) may be used by a super administrator who is in charge of managing an entire enterprise network which may include plural regional networks (e.g. Networks A and B). In contrast, each local administrator may be in charge of managing one of such plural regional networks via the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1.
The information storing unit 206b stores information captured from the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1. For example, as discussed above, setting information of the particular device management unit and device information maintained by the particular device management unit (which is obtained from the device management unit and received through the network communication unit 206c) are stored in the information storing unit 206b.
Further, when a particular device management unit is uninstalled from the corresponding host computer, thus making itself unavailable to the core management unit 206a, the information storing unit 206b continues to store the setting information of the particular device management unit and the device information that was captured from the particular device management unit. By doing so, when the particular device management unit is later reinstalled on the same or another host computer, the stored setting information of the particular device management unit can be utilized to reinstall the particular device management unit, and the device information of the particular device management unit can be uploaded to the particular device management unit upon reinstallation of the particular device management unit, thereby eliminating the need for the particular device management unit to re-collect the device information from the devices managed by the particular device management unit.
The network communication unit 206c allows the core management apparatus 206 to communicate through the network 209, such as with the device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 and the terminal 207.
In another exemplary embodiment, the network communication unit 206c is also configured to communicate with any particular device amongst plural heterogeneous devices that may be included in the system 200 in a communication format native to the particular device. For example, in the system 200, the network communication unit 206c may be configured to communicate with each of the devices 201-203 (including any other device management units, terminals and/or other devices that may be connected to the network 209) in a communication format established by the respective manufacturers/vendors of such devices. The network communication unit 206c may determine an appropriate communication format native to the particular device by any of various known approaches. For example, the network communication unit 206c may refer to a database or table, maintained internally or by an outside source, to determine an appropriate communication format native to the device. As another example, the network communication unit 206c may access an Application Program Interface (API) of the particular device, in order to determine an appropriate communication format native to the device.
As discussed above, the network communication unit 206c also receives setting information and device information from the device management units, communicates such setting information to a corresponding host computer when a device management unit is being installed.
Further, the network communication unit 206c may also communicate with a license management device external to the core management apparatus to activate or deactivate a particular device management unit. Such activation and deactivation of device management units are further discussed infra with reference to
As shown in
Each of the network connections 205 and 209 can include one or more connections via a secure intranet or extranet, a local area network (LAN), a wide area network (WAN) or any type of network such as an intranet, an extranet (for example, to provide controlled access to external users, for example through the Internet), the Internet, etc., or a combination thereof. Further, other communications links (such as a virtual private network, a wireless link, etc.) may be used as well for the networks 205 and 209. In addition, the networks 205 and 209 preferably use TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol), but other protocols such as SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol) and HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) can also be used. How devices can connect to and communicate over networks is well-known in the art and is discussed for example, in “How Networks Work”, by Frank J. Derfler, Jr. and Les Freed (Que Corporation 2000) and “How Computers Work”, by Ron White, (Que Corporation 1999), the entire contents of each of which are incorporated herein by reference. Although the devices 201-203 depicted in
With reference to
The example of
In the example of
In another exemplary embodiment, the storage unit 302 may be connected directly to the core management unit 301 or included within the core management unit 301. Although only one network (309) and three network devices (303-305) are shown in
Otherwise, operations of the elements of the system 300 are similar to those discussed in connection with the corresponding elements of the system 200 of
With reference to
The example of
The terminal 406 includes a processing unit 406a, a display unit 406b and a storage unit 406c. The storage unit 406c includes a device management application 406c-1 which includes a core management unit 406c-1a.
In the example of
The core management unit 406c-1a communicates with a license management device 407,
Once a particular device management unit is installed in the system, an activation process to activate the particular device management unit is initiated. In such activation process, the core management unit communicates with the license management device 407 to register the particular device management unit in association with, for example, a network address of the core management apparatus, with the license management device 407.
For example, when a device management unit (e.g. a licensed software product) is installed on a new host computer, the software product may have to be activated online before the user (e.g. licensee) can utilize the features of the software product.
In the case of a volume license which allows installation and use of multiple copies of the software product (e.g. device management units), the core management unit 407c-1a keeps track of the number of licenses remaining. For example, if five device management unit licenses are initially obtained from the developer (e.g. person or company who developed the device management unit) by registering the licenses in association with the information (e.g. IP address, serial number and/or unit ID) of the core management unit 407c-1a, upon the installation of the first device management unit on a host computer, the core management unit 407c-1a automatically decrements the number of remaining licenses from five to four. Here, the user installing the first device management unit does not have to activate the device management unit again at least for the first five device management units, since they have already been registered with the license management device 407 in association with the information of the core management unit 406c-1a. Even when a device management unit is uninstalled and reinstalled on another host computer, there need not be deactivation of the device management unit and activation of the newly installed device management unit, as long as the number of installed device management units are within the number of available licenses (e.g. 5 in this case)
In the example above, if the first device management unit is uninstalled from the host computer, the core management unit 407c-1a automatically increments the number of remaining licenses from four to five.
In the example of
Otherwise, operations of the elements of the system 400 are similar to those discussed in connection with the corresponding elements of the system 200 of
The management unit 600 may be a special-purpose device (such as including one or more application specific integrated circuits or an appropriate network of conventional component circuits) or it may be software-configured on a conventional personal computer or computer workstation with sufficient memory, processing and communication capabilities to operate as a terminal and/or server, as will be appreciated to those skilled in the relevant arts.
In the management unit 600, the controller 601 executes program code instructions that controls device operations. The controller 601, memory/storage 602, network interface 603, display 604 and keyboard 605 are conventional, and therefore in order to avoid occluding the inventive aspects of this disclosure, such conventional aspects will not be discussed in detail herein.
The management unit 600 includes the network interface 603 for communications through a network, such as communications through the network 209 with the network-connected devices 201-203 in
The core management unit and/or the device management units of the present disclosure are not limited to a server or computer, but can be manifested in any of various devices that can be configured to communicate over a network and/or the Internet.
An example of a configuration of the terminal 207 of
The memory 653 can provide storage for program and data, and may include a combination of assorted conventional storage devices such as buffers, registers and memories [for example, read-only memory (ROM), programmable ROM (PROM), erasable PROM (EPROM), electrically erasable PROM (EEPROM), static random access memory (SRAM), dynamic random access memory (DRAM), non-volatile random access memory (NOVRAM), etc.].
The network interface 659 provides a connection (for example, by way of an Ethernet connection or other network connection which supports any desired network protocol such as, but not limited to TCP/IP, IPX, IPX/SPX, or NetBEUI) to the network to which the computer 650 is connected (e.g. network 209 of
Print driver 656 and application software 655 are shown as components connected to the internal bus 651, but in practice are typically stored in storage media such as a hard disk or portable media, and/or received through the network, and loaded into memory 653 as the need arises.
Depending on the type of the particular terminal device, one or more of the components shown in
Additional aspects or components of the computer 650 are conventional (unless otherwise discussed herein), and in the interest of clarity and brevity are not discussed in detail herein. Such aspects and components are discussed, for example, in “How Computers Work”, by Ron White (Que Corporation 1999), and “How Networks Work”, by Frank J. Derfler, Jr. and Les Freed (Que Corporation 2000), the entire contents of each of which are incorporated herein by reference.
Each of the devices 201-203 of
The MFD 690 shown in
Storage 693 can include one or more storage parts or devices [e.g. a read only memory (for example, ROM, PROM, EPROM, EEPROM, etc.), a random access memory (RAM), a hard disk drive (HDD), portable media (for example, floppy disk, optical disc, magnetic discs, magneto-optical discs, semiconductor memory cards, etc.) drives], and program code instructions can be stored in one or more parts or devices of storage 693 and executed by the controller 692 to carry out the instructions. Such instructions can include instructions for performing specified functions (such as printing, scanning, faxing, copying, e-mailing, etc.) of the MFD 690, to enable the MFD 690 to interact with a terminal, as well as perhaps other external devices, through the network interface 696, and to control the converter 698, access data in the user management table 697, and interactions with users through the user I/O 699.
The network interface 696 is utilized by the MFD 690 to communicate with other network-connected devices such as a terminal or a device management unit (e.g., device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 of
The user I/O 699 includes one or more display screens that display, under control of controller 692, information allowing the user of the MFD 690 to interact with the MFD 690. The display screen can be any of various conventional displays (such as a liquid crystal display, a plasma display device, a cathode ray tube display, etc.), but preferably is equipped with a touch sensitive display (for example, liquid crystal display) and is configured to provide a GUI (graphical user interface) based on information input by an operator of the MFD 690, so as to allow the operator to interact conveniently with services provided on the MFD 690, or with the MFD 690 serving as terminal for accessing electronic data or other content through the network. User interfaces or other contents received through the network via the network interface 696 can be displayed on the display screen.
The display screen does not need to be integral with, or embedded in, a housing of the MFD 690, but may simply be coupled to the MFD 690 by either a wire or a wireless connection. The user I/O 699 may include keys and/or buttons (such as graphical keys or buttons, or other graphical elements, of a GUI on a touchscreen display) for inputting information or requesting various operations. Alternatively, the user I/O 699 and the display screen may be operated by a keyboard, a mouse, a remote control, voice recognition (e.g., through a speaker/microphone 699a), or eye-movement tracking, or a combination thereof.
Printer engine 694, scanner engine 695 and network interface 696 are otherwise conventional, and therefore, a detailed description of such conventional aspects is omitted in the interest of clarity and brevity.
The MFD 690 can have any or all of the functions of similar devices conventionally known, such as for scanning, editing and storing images, sending a fax, sending and receiving e-mails with or without attachments, accessing files by FTP or another protocol or facility, surfing the Web, etc. Further, multi-functional devices or multi-function peripheral devices can play a prominent role to convert hardcopy documents to electronic documents.
The MFD 690 may also operate as a device management unit (e.g. device management units 204A-1 and 204B-1 of
At the top of the screen, buttons are provided for returning to the main menu screen (“main menu”), installing a new network device or DM unit (“add”), configuring one or more existing devices or DM units (“configure”), uninstalling one or more existing devices or DM units (“uninstall”), and obtaining additional details regarding the device list (“help”).
For example, when a device is selected from the device list and the “configure” button is activated, a user interface for device configuration is displayed to the user, as shown in
The information of the DM unit specified for the particular device is recorded, for example, as part of the device management data maintained by either the core management unit or the device management unit, as shown in
For example, when the value of the “DM Unit” setting of a particular device (i.e. “Unicopy 1095S”) is changed from DM Unit 2 (
Referring back to
Turning now to
When an installation process for installing a device management (DM) unit or server on a host computer is begun (step S1201), a core management unit is accessed using a core server address and user login credentials (step S1202).
In S1203, it is checked whether the core server address and the user login credentials are correct. For example, the core management unit at the provided core server address may access a database which contains login credentials of users who are authorized to access the core management unit and check whether the provided user login credentials exist in the database.
If the provided core server address and user login credentials are correct (YES, S1203), the DM unit is automatically registered on the core management unit (step S1204), and setting information is provided to the DM unit to automatically configure the DM unit to work properly. The setting information may be the setting information previously stored for the particular DM unit, or setting information newly created by the core management unit based on the DM unit (e.g. based on the type, model, make, etc. of the DM unit). For example, settings that would typically be specified by the user are retrieved from the core management unit (e.g. “department” shown in
On the other hand, if the core server address and the user login credentials are incorrect (NO, S1203), a new set of server address and login credentials are requested or the installation process is terminated.
Turning now to
In S1251 and S1252, a DM unit is installed on a host computer, and a network address and authentication information obtained during the installation process are registered for the DM unit (e.g. in the device management registry shown in
Thus, by automatically obtaining the setting information and utilizing the obtained setting information to automatically complete the reinstallation process, the process of uninstalling the DM unit from a host computer and reinstalling on another host computer is simplified.
Turning now to
When a request to uninstall a DM unit is received (step S1302) after the DM unit has been registered in the device management registry (e.g.
By keeping the information corresponding to the uninstalled DM unit, the process of reconfiguring the DM unit when the DM unit is later reinstalled can be facilitated.
Turning now to
As shown in
When a DM unit is down for a long time, the user and the system cannot monitor or configure the devices managed by such DM unit. Thus, by monitoring whether a particular DM unit is inactive or unavailable, and by automatically reassigning the devices managed by such unavailable DM unit to another DM unit, adverse effects of a DM unit going down can be reduced.
For example, when the devices managed by such unavailable DM unit is automatically reassigned to another DM unit, the device management data corresponding to the devices are updated, as shown in
Turning now to
Upon installation of a DM unit on a host computer (step S1501), the core management unit determines whether the number of remaining licenses is greater than or equal to 1 (step S1502). If the number of remaining licenses is greater than or equal to 1 (YES, S1502), the installation of the DM unit is completed (step S1503), the number of remaining licenses is decremented by 1 (step S1504). In a similar manner, when a DM unit is uninstalled from the system, the remaining number of licenses is automatically incremented by 1. For example, although S1503 is performed before S1504 in this exemplary embodiment, the order in which the steps are performed may be switched in another exemplary embodiment.
In a case that the number of remaining licenses is less than 1 (i.e. zero) (NO, S1502), additional licenses are obtained (e.g. by communicating with the license management device, either automatically or with user approval) (step S1505), and the installation process is started over.
Thus, as long as the number of remaining licenses (which is maintained by the core management unit) is greater than or equal to 1, the user does not have to go through the activation process each time a DM unit is installed (e.g. all the available licenses have already been activated using the information of the core management unit). Thus, even if a DM is uninstalled from a host computer and reinstalled on a different host computer, the conventional deactivation and re-activation of the product are not needed.
In the aforementioned aspects of the present disclosure, even when the size of the network environment grows to include an overwhelming number of network-connected devices, thus necessitating multiple device management units, management of such device management units can be facilitated by providing convenient installation, uninstallation, reinstallation, activation and deactivation of the device management units and relocation (i.e. reassignment) of the devices managed by the device management units.
The aforementioned specific embodiments are illustrative, and many variations can be introduced on these embodiments without departing from the spirit of the disclosure or from the scope of the appended claims. For example, elements and/or features of different examples and illustrative embodiments may be combined with each other and/or substituted for each other within the scope of this disclosure and appended claims.
