Patent Issued for Systems And Methods For Computer Infrastructure Monitoring And Maintenance (USPTO 10,318,367)

2019 JUN 26 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- United Services Automobile Association (San Antonio, Texas, United States) has been issued patent number 10,318,367, according to news reporting originating out of Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx editors.

The patent’s inventors are Carranza, Manuel A. (San Antonio, TX); Sekula, Chase T. (San Antonio, TX); Moore, Mark S. (Little Elm, TX); Ringer, Mathew P. (Lytle, TX).

This patent was filed on May 13, 2016 and was published online on June 24, 2019.

From the background information supplied by the inventors, news correspondents obtained the following quote: “While it is common practice for businesses to monitor their computer networks and software processes, the amount of information that can be obtained may make it prohibitively expensive to diligently monitor that information. Thus, monitoring computer infrastructure may be a constant balancing act between gathering and analyzing enough information so as to reduce the chances of a problem escaping detection, while at the same time triaging the information gathered and analyzed so as to enable the monitoring process a realistic chance to perform the necessary and requested analysis.

“When a computer network or software process experiences a complete or partial failure, the resulting damage can be catastrophic. Many of today’s monitoring systems can only determine once a system is down, although there may have been certain events leading up to the system failure that could have indicated that the system was going to fail.

“Despite many attempts to address these problems, there remains a need for a solution to this problem that is both robust enough to dependably monitor important networks and help determine if a system failure may soon occur, and yet flexible enough to work with any computer or network infrastructure.

“Accordingly, there remains an unmet need for a sufficiently flexible and dependable approach to monitoring computer networks and software process output.”

Supplementing the background information on this patent, NewsRx reporters also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “One or more examples described herein relate to monitoring computer infrastructures (e.g., a network, an individual computer system, software processes, or combinations thereof) to detect existing or developing computer issues. In one example, the analytics module compares performance from a given time frame (e.g., the present time or the very recent past) to another time frame (e.g., a week ago). This comparison may reveal one or more differences in terms of error messages, network traffic, computer resource utilization, software process performance, or another computer metric, and, based on the type or level of the difference, a notification (e.g., warning) may be generated and communicated to a network administrator.

“In an aspect, this disclosure is directed to a method. The method may include identifying a target computer system. A first set of data for a first time period relating an operating metric from the target computer system may be received. The operating metric may be stored. A second set of data for a second time period relating to the operating metric may be received. The first and second sets of data may be compared. A difference between the two sets of data may be identified. If the difference between the two sets of data is outside a predetermined range a determination may be made that there is an issue on the target computing system that needs to be resolved. A warning notification may be displayed in a graphical user interface, wherein the warning notification is displayed differently depending on a severity level of the warning. Instructions may be provided on how to resolve the issue.

“In another aspect, this disclosure is directed to a system. The system may include a computer device connected to a network and a memory electronically coupled to the computer device. The memory may include instructions that cause the at least one computer device to effectuate certain operations. The operations may include identifying a target computer system, receiving a first set of data relating an operating metric from the target computer system, storing the operating metric, receiving a second set of data relating to the operating metric, comparing the first and second sets of data, identifying a difference between the two sets of data, determining that there is an issue that needs to be resolved on the target computing system if the difference between the two sets of data is outside a predetermined range, displaying a warning notification in a graphical user interface, wherein the warning notification may be displayed differently depending on a severity level of the warning, and providing instructions on how to resolve the issue.

“According to another aspect, this disclosure is directed to a non-transitory computer readable storage medium. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium may include computer-executable instructions that cause a processor to effectuate certain operations. The operations may include identifying a target computer system, receiving a first set of data relating an operating metric from the target computer system, storing the operating metric, receiving a second set of data relating to the operating metric, comparing the first and second sets of data, identifying a difference between the two sets of data, determining that there is an issue that needs to be resolved on the target computing system if the difference between the two sets of data is outside a predetermined range, displaying a warning notification in a graphical user interface, wherein the warning notification may be displayed differently depending on a severity level of the warning, and providing instructions on how to resolve the issue.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“What is claimed:

“1. A method for detecting computer issues, comprising: receiving a first set of data for a first time period relating an operating metric from a target computer system; receiving a second set of data for a second time period relating to the operating metric; aggregating error log data for the first set of data and the second set of data; filtering out secondary data from the aggregated error log data; determining, based on the filtered aggregated error log data, a number of errors of an error type from the first set of data and a number of errors of the error type from the second set of data; determining, based on a difference between the number of errors from the first set of data and the number of errors from the second set of data, a severity level of a warning associated with operation of the target computer system; displaying, based on the severity level of the warning, a warning notification in a graphical user interface, wherein the warning notification is displayed differently depending on the severity level of the warning, and wherein the warning notification is indicative of an issue associated with the operation of the target computer system; and providing instructions on how to resolve the issue.

“2. The method of claim 1, wherein the operating metric comprises at least one of CPU usage, GPU usage, memory usage, hard drive usage, software process performance metrics, network latency, network bandwidth, or error log messages.

“3. The method of claim 1, wherein the secondary data comprises username information.

“4. The method of claim 1, wherein the instructions on how to resolve the issue are displayed in a second interface, wherein the second interface is displayed after receiving an input, and wherein the second interface comprises a web page or knowledge base.

“5. The method of claim 1, further comprising establishing a remote connection to the target computer system from within the GUI.

“6. The method of claim 1, wherein the secondary data comprises a string.

“7. The method of claim 1, wherein the filtering the secondary data comprises replacing the secondary data with a generic filler.

“8. The method of claim 1, wherein the secondary data comprises data that prevents aggregation of error messages.

“9. A system of detecting computer issues, the system comprising: a computer device connected to a network; and memory electronically coupled to the computer device, the memory comprising instructions that cause the computer device to effectuate operations comprising: receiving a first set of data relating an operating metric from a target computer system; receiving a second set of data relating to the operating metric; aggregating error log data for the first set of data and the second set of data; filtering out secondary data from the aggregated error log data; determining, based on the filtered aggregated error log data, a number of errors of an error type from the first set of data and a number of errors of the error type from the second set of data; determining, based on a difference between the number of errors from the first set of data and the number of errors from the second set of data, a severity level of a warning associated with operation of the target computer system; displaying, based on the severity level of the warning, a warning notification in a graphical user interface, wherein the warning notification is displayed differently depending on the severity level of the warning, and wherein the warning notification is indicative of an issue associated with the operation of the target computer system; and providing instructions on how to resolve the issue.

“10. The system of claim 9, wherein the operating metric comprises at least one of CPU usage, GPU usage, memory usage, hard drive usage, software process performance metrics, network latency, network bandwidth, or error log messages.

“11. The system of claim 9, wherein the secondary data comprises username information.

“12. The system of claim 9, wherein the instructions on how to resolve the issue are displayed in a second interface, wherein the second interface is displayed after receiving an input, and wherein the second interface comprises a web page or knowledge base.

“13. The system of claim 9, wherein the operations further comprise establishing a remote connection to the target computer system from within the graphical user interface.

“14. The system of claim 9, wherein the secondary data comprises at least one of a string, a generic filler, or data that prevents aggregation of error messages.

“15. A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising computer-executable instructions that cause a processor to effectuate operations comprising: receiving a first set of data for a first time period relating an operating metric from a target computer system; receiving a second set of data for a second time period relating to the operating metric; aggregating error log data for the first set of data and the second set of data; filtering out secondary data from the aggregated error log data; determining, based on the filtered aggregated error log data, a number of errors of an error type from the first set of data and a number of errors of the error type from the second set of data; determining, based on a difference between the number of errors from the first set of data and the number of errors from the second set of data, a severity level of a warning associated with operation of the target computer system; displaying, based on the severity level of the warning, a warning notification in a graphical user interface wherein the warning notification is displayed differently depending on the severity level of the warning, and wherein the warning notification is indicative of an issue associated with the operation of the target computer system; and providing instructions on how to resolve the issue.

“16. The medium of claim 15, wherein the operating metric comprises at least one of CPU usage, GPU usage, memory usage, hard drive usage, software process performance metrics, network latency, network bandwidth, or error log messages.

“17. The medium of claim 15, wherein the instructions on how to resolve the issue are displayed in a second interface, wherein the second interface is displayed after receiving an input, and wherein the second interface comprises a web page or knowledge base.

“18. The medium of claim 15, wherein the computer-executable instructions further comprise establishing a remote connection to the target computer system from within the graphical user interface.

“19. The non-transitory medium of claim 15, wherein the secondary data comprises at least one of a string, a generic filler, or data that prevents aggregation of error messages.”

For the URL and additional information on this patent, see: Carranza, Manuel A.; Sekula, Chase T.; Moore, Mark S.; Ringer, Mathew P. Systems And Methods For Computer Infrastructure Monitoring And Maintenance. U.S. Patent Number 10,318,367, filed May 13, 2016, and published online on June 24, 2019. Patent URL: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=10,318,367.PN.&OS=PN/10,318,367RS=PN/10,318,367

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