Patent ID: 6549932
Filing Date: 2003-04-15
Classification: G06F,H04L

Abstract:
A method of discovery in a distributed computer network having a management server servicing a set of machines, comprising the steps of:deploying instances of a runtime engine across a subset of the machines to create a distributed runtime environment in the distributed computer network; in response to a task deployment request, migrating a discovery agent across a given set of nodes in the computer network; and executing the discovery agent in the runtime environment at each node at which the discovery agent is received to perform the following steps: (a) determining whether the machine at the node is a target of the task deployment request; (b) identifying a given subset of nodes associated with the node that remain candidates for the task deployment request; (c) deploying the discovery agent to the given subset; and (d) repeating steps (a)-(c) until the targets are identified or all network paths are exhausted.