Patent ID: 7231377

Claim:
A method comprising: generating a raw knowledge base, the generating of the raw knowledge base comprising: identifying a plurality of server roles; storing the plurality of server roles in the raw knowledge base; for each of the plurality of server roles: identifying at least one service used by the server role, including identifying a security service used by the server role; identifying at least one communication port used by the server role; identifying any web-related requirements of the server role; responsive to one or more dependencies between server roles, identifying the dependencies between the server roles; storing the identified information regarding each of the server roles in the raw knowledge base; providing the identified information stored in the raw knowledge base for comparison with a current state of a server; based on the comparison, creating a run-time specific knowledge base representative of configurations that the server is capable of performing; and presenting a user interface comprising configuration options to an administrator, wherein the user interface restricts selection of the configuration options to the configurations that the server is capable of performing.