Method and apparatus for multi-realm system modeling

1. A computer implemented method for modeling a system having one or more components, comprising:

(a) dividing said system into one or more components; wherein a component is a logical or physical element or collection of elements of the system;

(b) defining realms containing objects representing said one or more components; wherein the objects are an abstract representation of one or more of the components of the system and representations of a relationships between system components, wherein the realms and the objects represent a computer implemented model of the system, and wherein the realms represent different technology layers and at least one realm is selected from the group comprising a physical network, a link layer, a network layer, a system layer, a middleware, an application layer, and a business services layer;

(c) defining relationships among realms sufficient to unify objects in said realms by identifying the objects as representing the same system component or components, or by relating objects according to some relationship between the system components the object represents, wherein said relationships are representative of an attribute of state of an object in one realm conditioning an operation of an object in a second realm; wherein each relationship of the relationships denotes that a first object in one realm represents a represented object in another realm and where the first object in one realm represents different roles or attributes of the represented object in the second realm and wherein at least one relationship is selected from the group comprising a transaction, a virtual path, a system constraint, a containment, a connectivity, a layering relationship, a client-server relationship, and a consumer-producer relationship; and

(d) unifying objects in said realms based on the defined relationships, wherein unifying objects recognizes that objects represent the same component, portion of a component, collection of components or represent related components, to enable real time processing to be performed on the one or more objects in the one realm independently of the one or more objects of another realm to update the one or more objects, enabling the results of the processing in the one realm to be propagated to processing in another realm, while processing is occurring in the other realm, based on the defined relationship, which enable unified processing in the model based on the processing in each realm; wherein unified processing enables processing distributed into several processing instances in the different realms to be combined based on associations between the realms into a system wide result.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising the step of unified processing of two or more realms by performing processing in each of said two or more realms, and combining results thereof based on said relationships of said two or more realms.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the objects are identical.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the objects are different.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein said plurality of realms are defined based on functions of components in said system.

6. The method as recited in claim 1 , wherein the defined realms are associated with different components.

7. The method as recited in claim 1 , wherein the defined realms are associated with the same component.

8. The method of claim 2 wherein said unified processing is selected from the group consisting of: monitoring, analyzing, controlling, simulating, visualizing, configuration managing, provisioning, designing, and event correlating.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein said unified processing further comprises:

propagation of behaviors of said system across realms.

10. The method of claim 8 wherein said analysis comprises root cause analysis of events in said system.

11. A computer program product embodied on a non-transitory computer readable medium for modeling a system having one or more components, the computer program product comprising instructions for causing a computer to execute the steps of:

(a) dividing said system into one or more components; wherein a component is a logical or physical element or collection of elements of the system;

(b) defining realms containing objects representing said one or more components; wherein the objects are an abstract representation of one or more of the components of the system and representations of a relationships between system components, wherein the realms and the objects represent a computer implemented model of the system, and wherein the realms represent different technology layers and at least one realm is selected from the group comprising a physical network, a link layer, a network layer, a system layer, a middleware, an application layer, and a business services layer;

(c) defining relationships among realms sufficient to unify objects in said realms by identifying the objects as representing the same system component or components, or by relating objects according to some relationship between the system components the object represents, wherein said relationships are representative of an attribute of state of an object in one realm conditioning an operation of an object in a second realm; wherein each relationship of the relationships denotes that a first object in one realm represents a represented object in another realm and where the first object in one realm represents different roles or attributes of the represented object in the second realm and wherein at least one relationship is selected from the group comprising a transaction, a virtual path, a system constraint, a containment, a connectivity, a layering relationship, a client-server relationship, and a consumer-producer relationship; and

(d) unifying objects in said realms based on the defined relationships, wherein unifying objects recognizes that objects represent the same component, portion of a component, collection of components or represent related components, to enable real time processing to be performed on the one or more objects in the one realm independently of the one or more objects of another realm to the one or more objects, enabling the results of the processing in the one realm to be propagated to processing in another realm, while processing is occurring in the other realm, based on the defined relationship, which enable unified processing in the model based on the processing in each realm; wherein unified processing enables processing distributed into several processing instances in the different realms to be combined based on associations between the realms into a system wide result.

12. The computer program product of claim 11 further causing the processor to execute the step of:

unified processing of two or more realms by performing processing in each of said two or more realms, and combining results thereof based on said relationships of said two or more realms.

13. The computer program product of claim 11 wherein the objects are identical.

14. The computer program product of claim 11 wherein the objects are different.

15. The computer program product of claim 11 wherein said plurality of realms are defined based on functions of components in said system.

16. The computer program product as recited in claim 11 , wherein the defined realms are associated with different components.

17. The computer program product as recited in claim 11 , wherein the defined realms are associated with the same component.

18. The computer program product of claim 12 wherein said unified processing is selected from the group consisting of: monitoring, analyzing, controlling, simulating, visualizing, configuration managing, provisioning, designing, and event correlating.

19. The computer program product of claim 18 wherein said unified processing further comprises:

propagation of behaviors of said system of said system across realms.

20. The computer program product of claim 18 wherein said analysis comprises root cause analysis of events in said system.

21. An apparatus for modeling a system having one or more components, comprising:

a processor in communication with a memory, the processor executing code for executing the steps of:

(a) dividing said system into one or more components; wherein a component is a logical or physical element or collection of elements of the system;

(b) defining realms containing objects representing said one or more components; wherein the objects are an abstract representation of one or more of the components of the system and representations of a relationships between system components, wherein the realms and the objects represent a computer implemented model of the system, and wherein the realms represent different technology layers and at least one realm is selected from the group comprising a physical network, a link layer, a network layer, a system layer, a middleware, an application layer, and a business services layer;

(c) defining relationships among realms sufficient to unify objects in said realms by identifying the objects as representing the same system component or components, or by relating objects according to some relationship between the system components the object represents, wherein said relationships are representative of an attribute of state of an object in one realm conditioning an operation of an object in a second realm; wherein each relationship of the relationships denotes that a first object in one realm represents a represented object in another realm and where the first object in one realm represents different roles or attributes of the represented object in the second realm and wherein at least one relationship is selected from the group comprising a transaction, a virtual path, a system constraint, a containment, a connectivity, a layering relationship, a client-server relationship, and a consumer-producer relationship; and

(d) unifying objects in said realms based on the defined relationships, wherein unifying objects recognizes that objects represent the same component, portion of a component, collection of components or represent related components, to enable real time processing to be performed on the one or more objects in the one realm independently of the one or more objects of another realm to update the one or more objects, enabling the results of the processing in the one realm to be propagated to processing in another realm, while processing is occurring in the other realm, based on the defined relationship, which enable unified processing in the model based on the processing in each realm; wherein unified processing enables processing distributed into several processing instances in the different realms to be combined based on associations between the realms into a system wide result.

22. The apparatus of claim 21 , wherein the processor further executing the step of:

unified processing of two or more realms by performing processing in each of said two or more realms, and combining results thereof based on said relationships of said two or more realms.

23. The apparatus of claim 21 wherein the objects are identical.

24. The apparatus of claim 21 wherein the objects are different.

25. The apparatus of claim 21 wherein said plurality of realms are defined based on functions of components in said system.

26. The apparatus as recited in claim 21 , wherein the defined realms are associated with different components.

27. The apparatus as recited in claim 21 , wherein the defined realms are associated with the same components.

28. The apparatus of claim 22 wherein said unified processing is selected from the group consisting of: monitoring, analyzing, controlling, simulating, visualizing, configuration managing, provisioning, designing, and event correlating.

29. The apparatus of claim 28 wherein said unified processing further comprises:

propagation of behaviors of said system of said system across realms.

30. The apparatus of claim 28 wherein said analysis comprises root cause analysis of events in said system.