Patent ID: 7536290

Claim:
A computer-implemented method of model-based management of an existing information processing system comprising: employing a model in a computer, the model including: a defined set of components making up an information processing system, the set of components being configured to perform information processing functions including web service and database service, and a set of defined instructions configured to discover data about a plurality of resources potentially present in the existing information processing system, including a web server and a database server that is used by the web server, each of the defined instructions being configured to request a specified datum associated with a specified one of said resources, said resources corresponding to said components; creating a snapshot of the existing information processing system using the model by executing the set of defined instructions, the snapshot comprising a plurality of the specified data of a plurality of resources actually present within the existing information processing system, including information that identifies memory usage of the web server; evaluating the snapshot, including the information that identifies memory usage of the web server, using an overlay; identifying one or more of the resources that need to be changed in order to implement an upgrade to the existing information processing system; and presenting the identified one or more resources that need to be changed to cause the existing information system to be upgraded.