Information matching system and its matching method for matching information between terminal equipment connected via network

An information matching system having managing equipment and managed equipment which are connected over a network, the managed equipment comprising a state monitor for creating a notice message with a sequence number informing the managing equipment of a change of the own state and a controller for resending a log of a necessary notice message to the managing equipment according to an instruction from the managing equipment, the managing equipment comprising a management information updating unit for checking whether the sequence number attached to the notice message delivered from the managed equipment is successive or not and a controller for giving a resending instruction of a log of a notice message having the missing sequence number to the managed equipment.

BACKGROUNDS OF THE INVENTION 
1. Field of the Invention 
The present invention relates to an information matching system and its 
matching method for matching information on the state of equipment to be 
managed by managing equipment (hereinafter, referred to as management 
information) with actual state of the managed equipment in communication 
between terminal equipment connected via a network. 
2. Description of the Related Art 
In a system having a plurality of terminal equipment via a network, the 
plurality of terminal equipment consisting of managing equipment for 
managing the state of each terminal equipment and managed equipment to be 
managed by the managing equipment, an event notice informing the change, 
if a change of the state occurred in some managed equipment, is issued 
from the managed equipment to the managing equipment, and the management 
information in the managing equipment is updated, thereby performing 
information matching processing. A change of the state means, by way of 
example, occurrence of a failure, restoration, modification of various 
setting in the managed equipment, and detachment and attachment of a new 
hardware package. 
When using TCP/IP(Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) as a 
communication protocol among terminal equipment over a network, such a TCP 
(Transmission Control Protocol) having a resending function is used for 
the communication of information requiring reliability. By the TCP, 
however, the communication speed is slow for the performance of the 
resending processing. Therefore, a use of the TCP in all the communication 
of information would be a great burden and inefficient. Instead, the UDP 
(User Datagram Protocol) having no resending function and hence enabling 
high speed communication is used for the above-mentioned event notice 
informing managing equipment that the state of managed equipment has been 
changed. 
If the above-mentioned event notice informing managing equipment about a 
change of the state of managed equipment is lost on the way in 
communication, the management information on the managed equipment in the 
managing equipment is out of accord with the actual state of the managed 
equipment. When using the UDP as a protocol, the UDP would not resend an 
event notice, which is incapable of recovering the disagreement between 
the management information and the actual state. 
In order to solve this problem, there is a method of periodically reading 
out information including histories about all the changes of the state of 
managed equipment to be managed by managing equipment, by use of the TCP 
having a resending function. This enables the managing equipment to obtain 
the lost event notice, even if losing given event notice, thereby to match 
the management information of the managing equipment with the actual state 
of the managed equipment. 
However, a large amount of data communication in periodically reading out 
the information including histories about all the changes of the state of 
each managed equipment, results in increasing communication load of 
terminal equipment and a network. 
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
An object of the present invention is to provide a network information 
matching system and its matching method capable of decreasing 
communication load by resending only the lost notice massage being 
specified when losing a notice message informing a change of the state. 
In addition to the above object, another object of the present invention is 
to provide a network information matching system and its matching method 
capable of matching the mutual state of terminal equipment quickly and 
easily by requiring to resend the notice message at once if detecting a 
lost notice message. 
According to the first aspect of the invention, an information matching 
system, performing communication among terminal equipment connected via a 
network, for matching content of management information about state of 
managed equipment to be managed by managing equipment with actual state of 
the managed equipment, wherein the managed equipment comprises 
a state monitoring means for monitoring the 
state of the own equipment, creating a notice message if a change of the 
state occurs, attaching a sequence number to every created notice message, 
and delivering it to the managing equipment, 
a log storing means for storing a log of the sequence number-attached 
notice message created by the state monitoring means, and 
a replying means for reading out a log of a necessary notice message from 
the log storing means according to an instruction of the managing 
equipment and delivering it to the managing equipment, while 
the managing equipment comprises 
a management information storing means for storing management information 
about the state of the managed equipment, 
a management information updating means for updating the management 
information stored in the management information storing means according 
to the notice message and the sequence number attached thereto that are 
delivered from the managed equipment, and checking whether the sequence 
number included in the management information and the sequence number 
attached to the notice message are continued or not, and 
a resending requesting means for giving a resending instruction of a log of 
the notice message having the missing sequence number to the managed 
equipment when discontinuity of the sequence numbers is detected by the 
management information updating means. 
In the preferred construction, based on a notice message issued according 
to occurrence of a change in the state of every managed equipment, the 
management information storing means stores each combination of the 
content of the change indicated in the notice message and the 
corresponding sequence number attached to the notice message, as 
management information on the managed equipment. 
In the preferred construction, the management information updating means 
checks the continuity and the presence of a missing number by comparison 
between the sequence number included in the management information stored 
in the management information storing means and the sequence number 
attached to the received notice message, and the resending requesting 
means requires the managed equipment to resend a notice message having the 
sequence number judged to be missing by the management information 
updating means. 
In another preferred construction, the state monitoring means of the 
managed equipment detects, at least, a failure of the own equipment and 
its restoration as a change of the state. 
According to the second aspect of the invention, an information matching 
method for performing communication among terminal equipment connected via 
a network and matching content of management information about state of 
managed equipment to be managed by managing equipment with actual state of 
the managed equipment, the method comprising the steps of 
in the managed equipment, 
a step of monitoring the state of the own equipment, creating a notice 
message if a change of the state occurs, attaching a sequence number to 
every created notice message, and delivering it to the managing equipment, 
a step of storing a log of the created sequence number-attached notice 
message in the log storing means, and 
a step of reading out a log of a necessary notice message from the log 
storing means according to an instruction from the managing equipment and 
delivering it to the managing equipment, while 
in the managing equipment, 
a step of checking whether the sequence number attached to the notice 
message delivered from the managed equipment and the sequence number 
included in the management information are continued or not, and 
a step of giving a resending instruction of a log of a notice message 
having the missing sequence number to the managed equipment when the 
sequence numbers are not continued. 
In the preferred construction, the information matching method further 
comprises, in the managed equipment, a step of updating the management 
information based on the notice message and a sequence number attached to 
the same notice message when the sequence numbers are continued as a 
result of the examination of the sequence number checking step. 
According to another aspect of the invention, a computer readable memory 
storing a control program for controlling managing equipment and managed 
equipment, for use in an information matching system, of performing 
communication among terminal equipment connected via a network, for 
matching content of management information about the state of the managed 
equipment to be managed by the managing equipment with actual state of the 
managed equipment, the control program comprising 
in the managed equipment, 
a step of monitoring the state of the own equipment, creating a notice 
message if a change of the state occurs, attaching a sequence number to 
every created notice message, and delivering it to the managing equipment, 
a step of storing a log of the created sequence number-attached notice 
message in the log storing means, and 
a step of reading out a log of a necessary notice message from the log 
storing means according to an instruction from the managing equipment and 
delivering it to the managing equipment, while 
in the managing equipment, 
a step of checking whether the sequence number attached to the notice 
message delivered from the managed equipment and the sequence number 
included in the management information are continued or not, and 
a step of giving a resending instruction of a log of a notice message 
having the missing sequence number to the managed equipment when the 
sequence numbers are not continued. 
Other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become 
clear from the detailed description given herebelow.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT 
The preferred embodiment of the present invention will be discussed 
hereinafter in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. In the 
following description, numerous specific details are set forth in order to 
provide a thorough understanding of the present invention. It will be 
obvious, however, to those skilled in the art that the present invention 
may be practiced without these specific details. In other instance, 
well-known structures are not shown in detail in order to unnecessary 
obscure the present invention. 
FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the structure of a network information 
matching system according to an embodiment of the present invention. As 
illustrated in FIG. 1, the network information matching system of the 
embodiment comprises a plurality of terminal equipment connected via a 
network, the plurality of terminal equipment consisting of managing 
equipment 10 for managing each terminal equipment connected to the network 
and each managed equipment 20 to be managed by the managing equipment 10. 
The managing equipment 10 includes an interface 11 for transferring 
information via a network, a management information updating unit 12 for 
updating management information of each managed equipment 20, a management 
information storing unit 13 for storing the management information of each 
managed equipment 20, and a controller 14 for controlling each function 
executing unit 11, 12, and 13. The management information means the 
information indicating the state of each managed equipment 20. The managed 
equipment 20 includes an interface 21 for transferring information via a 
network, a state monitor 22 for monitoring the state of the own equipment 
and creating a notice message if a change of the state occurs, a log file 
23 for storing a log of the created notice message, and a controller 24 
for controlling each function executing unit 21, 22, and 23. FIG. 1 shows 
only the characteristic components in the embodiment, and the description 
of the other general components is omitted. Each managed equipment 20 
shown in FIG. 1 has the same structure, and hence, with the description of 
the structure of only one managed equipment 20, the description of the 
structure of the other managed equipment 20 is omitted. 
In the managed equipment 20, the state monitor 22 may be realized by, for 
example, a program-controlled CPU and an internal memory such as a RAM or 
the like. While monitoring the state of the own equipment, it creates a 
notice message indicating the change when detecting a change of the state 
and attaches the sequence number to the message. The notice message with 
the sequence number attached there is delivered to the managing equipment 
10 via the interface 21 and it is stored in the log file 23. 
The controller 24 may be realized by, for example, a program-controlled CPU 
and an internal memory such as a RAM or the like. It controls each 
operation of the interface 21, the state monitor 22, and the log file 23, 
and reads out the log of a required notice message from the log file 23 
according to the instruction of the managing equipment 10, so to deliver 
it to the managing equipment 10 via the interface 21. The computer program 
for controlling the controller 24 is provided, stored in a general storing 
medium such as a magnetic disk, an optical disk, a semiconductor memory, 
or the like, and it is loaded in the controller 24 to execute the above 
function. 
In the managing equipment 10, the management information updating unit 12 
may be realized by, for example, a program-controlled CPU and an internal 
memory such as a RAM or the like. Receiving a notice message delivered 
from managed equipment 20 to the interface 11 via a network, the unit 12 
updates the management information on the same managed equipment 20 stored 
in the management information storing unit 13 according to the content of 
the notice message. Thus, the state of the same managed equipment 20 after 
having been changed as indicated in the notice message and the sequence 
number of the notice message informing a change of the state are stored in 
the management information storing unit 13 as the management information. 
The management information updating unit 12 makes a comparison between the 
sequence number in the management information on the managed equipment 20 
stored in the management information storing unit 13 and the sequence 
number attached to the received notice message. When there is a missing 
number, in other words, when the above sequence numbers are not continued, 
the unit 12 informs the controller 14 of it. 
The controller 14 may be realized by, for example, a program-controlled CPU 
and an internal memory such as a RAM or the like. It controls each 
operation of the interface 11, the management information updating unit 
12, and the management information storing unit 13, and upon receipt of a 
notice informing that the sequence number of a notice message is not 
successive, from the management information updating unit 12, it supplies 
a resending instruction of the missing notice message to the managed 
equipment 20 having created the notice message, via the interface 11. The 
computer program for controlling the controller 14 is provided, stored in 
a general storing medium such as a magnetic disk, an optical disk, a 
semiconductor memory, or the like, and it is loaded in the controller 14 
so to execute the above function. 
This time, each operation of the managing equipment 10 and the managed 
equipment 20 will be described with reference to the flow charts of FIGS. 
2 and 3. 
FIG. 2 is a flow chart showing the operation of the managing equipment 10. 
With reference to FIG. 2, when the interface 11 receives a notice message 
delivered from each managed equipment 20 via a network, in the managing 
equipment 10 (Step 201), the notice message is delivered to the management 
information updating unit 12. The management information updating unit 12 
makes a comparison between the sequence number included in the management 
information on the relevant managed equipment 20 stored in the management 
information storing unit 13 and the sequence number attached to the 
received notice message. If the sequence number of the notice message is 
successive, the management information on the relevant managed equipment 
20 in the management information storing unit 13 is updated according to 
the received notice message (Steps 202, and 205). 
If the sequence number of the notice message is not successive, it means 
that there is a notice message which has been lost since it was created by 
managed equipment 20 before reaching the managing equipment 10. The 
management information updating unit 12 informs the controller 14 that the 
sequence number is not successive (Steps 202 and 203). Upon receipt of 
such information from the management information updating unit 12, the 
controller 14 sends a resending instruction of the notice message 
corresponding to the missing sequence number, to the managed equipment 20 
and requires the corresponding managed equipment 20 to resend the log of 
the missing notice message (Step 204). 
FIG. 3 is a flow chart showing the operation of the managed equipment 20 
when receiving a resending instruction of a notice message from the 
managing equipment 10. In managed equipment 20, the state monitor 22 
creates a notice message informing the change of the state every time a 
change of state occurs, delivers it to the managing equipment 10, and 
stores it in the log file 23, in its usual operation. When the interface 
21 of the managed equipment 20 receives the resending instruction of the 
notice message from the managing equipment 10 via a network (Step 301), 
the controller 24 reads out the log of the notice message having the 
sequence number indicated in the resending instruction, from the log file 
23 (Step 302), and returns the read out log of the notice message to the 
managing equipment 10 (Step 303). 
In the above description, the state monitor 22 of managed equipment 
attaches the sequence number to a notice message and the management 
information updating unit 12 of managing equipment judges whether there is 
a missing notice message or not depending on whether the sequence numbers 
of the management information and the notice message are continued or not. 
However, a method of judging continuity of a notice message is not 
restricted to the above example. For example, a unique mark based on a 
given rule, instead of the sequence number, may be attached to a notice 
message in the state monitor 22. In this case, the management information 
updating unit 12 judges whether the marks of the management information 
and the notice message are continued or not, according to the given rule. 
FIG. 4 is a sequence view showing the whole flow of the operation according 
to the embodiment. The operation for matching the mutual state of terminal 
equipment according to the embodiment will be described with reference to 
FIG. 4. In the initial stage, the content of the management information of 
the managing equipment 10 is matched with the state of the managed 
equipment 20. 
When a change of the state occurs in the managed equipment 20, the state 
monitor 22 of the managed equipment 20 creates a notice message informing 
the change of the state. The sequence number "No. 1" is attached to the 
created notice message, then to be stored in the log file 23 and delivered 
to the managing equipment 10. Upon receipt of the notice message from the 
managed equipment 20, the managing equipment 10 updates the management 
information on the corresponding managed equipment 20 in the management 
information storing unit 23 according to the content of the notice 
message, so that it may be matched with the state of the corresponding 
managed equipment 20. 
When another change occurs in the managed equipment 20, a notice message 
informing the change is created and the sequence number "No. 2" is 
attached to the notice message. The notice message is stored in the log 
file 23 and delivered to the managing equipment 10. Assume that this 
notice message is lost on the way of transmission. Since the managing 
equipment 10 cannot receive this notice message in this case, the 
management information on the corresponding managed equipment 20 in the 
management information storing unit 13 is not updated. Therefore, the 
state of the corresponding managed equipment 20 in the management 
information is not matched with the actual state of the corresponding 
managed equipment 20. 
Further, when another change occurs in the managed equipment 20, a notice 
message informing the change is created and the sequence number "No. 3" is 
attached to the notice message. The notice message is stored in the log 
file 23 and delivered to the managing equipment 10. When the managing 
equipment 10 receives the notice message with the sequence number "No. 3" 
attached there, the management information updating unit 12 makes a 
comparison between the sequence number "No. 1" included in the management 
information on the corresponding managed equipment 20 stored in the 
management information storing unit 13 and the sequence number "No. 3" of 
the received notice message and recognizes that the sequence number "No. 
2" is missing. Then, the controller 14 requires the corresponding managed 
equipment 20 to resend the notice message having the missing sequence 
number "No. 2". 
The managed equipment 20, upon receipt of the resending request of the 
notice message from the managing equipment 10, reads out the notice 
massage having the sequence number "No. 2" being required, from the log 
file 23 and returns it to the managing equipment 10. The managing 
equipment 10, upon receipt of the notice message returned from the managed 
equipment 20 in reply to the resending request, updates the management 
information on the corresponding managed equipment 20 stored in the 
management information storing unit 13 according to the content of the 
reply message. 
As set forth hereinabove, according to the network information matching 
system and its matching method of the present invention, a resending 
instruction is given to the managed equipment with specification of the 
missing notice message if having lost a notice message informing that a 
change of the state occurred in some managed equipment, since it was 
created, before it reaches the managing equipment, thereby making it 
possible to match the state of the managed equipment managed by the 
managing equipment with the actual state of the same managed equipment. 
Therefore, it is effective in decreasing a lot of communication load taken 
in order to match the mutual state of terminal equipment. 
Further, at the time of discontinuity in the sequence number of a notice 
message, the managing equipment can recognize that the notice message 
having the missing sequence number has been lost and require the 
corresponding managed equipment to resend the notice message at once, 
thereby making it possible to match the mutual state of the terminal 
equipment more quickly and easily compared with the case of periodically 
informing the managing equipment of the change of the state in the managed 
equipment. 
Although the invention has been illustrated and described with respect to 
exemplary embodiment thereof, it should be understood by those skilled in 
the art that the foregoing and various other changes, omissions and 
additions may be made therein and thereto, without departing from the 
spirit and scope of the present invention. Therefore, the present 
invention should not be understood as limited to the specific embodiment 
set out above but to include all possible embodiments which can be 
embodies within a scope encompassed and equivalents thereof with respect 
to the feature set out in the appended claims.