Patent ID: 7675866

Claim:
A method for analyzing resource needs for a configurable computing system representing the configuration in a statically defined tree structure, said tree structure having a plurality of nodes representing stored configuration data, a first set of said nodes comprising childless nodes and a second set of said nodes comprising parent nodes, each parent node having at least one child node, each node having a plurality of attributes, a first set of said attributes being statically defined in the configuration under evaluation and a second set of said attributes being dynamically modifiable, the method for analyzing comprising the steps of: a) determining, by a computer system, the worst case resource needs of said childless nodes during an execution cycle by evaluating the actual configuration values of any statically defined attributes that the childless node may have and the worst case values of any dynamic attributes that the childless node may have; b) determining, by a computer system, the worst case resource needs of said parent nodes during an execution cycle by: i) determining the worst case resource needs of the child nodes of a given parent node, by evaluating the actual configuration values of any statically defined attributes that the child node may have and the worst case values of any dynamic attributes that each child node may have; ii) determining the partial worst case resource needs of said given parent node, by evaluating the actual configuration values of any statically defined attributes that the given parent node may have and the worst case values of any dynamic attributes that given parent node may have, as if that given parent node is a childless node; and, iii) summing a) said worst case resource needs of said child nodes of said given parent node and, b) said partial worst case resource needs of said given parent node; and, c) recursively, by a computer system, applying the rules used for evaluating the worst case resource needs of the individual nodes, above, starting with a root node of said plurality of nodes, to determine the worst case resource needs of said entire tree structure.