Patent ID: 8024713

Claim:
A customer service environment comprising: a plurality of hosts, wherein said hosts are software objects for an application domain distributed within a grid environment, said grid environment being a distributed computing system that includes a plurality of hardware and software components; at least one ghost agent configured to be associated with at least one of said hosts to replicate and record at least one action of said at least one of said host, wherein said ghost agent moves within a grid environment and is configured to include at least one of a test engine, a ghost log, and a controller, said test engine configured to load test routines into said ghost agent, execute the test routines in response to received test commands, and analyze within said ghost agent results of the executed test routines, said ghost log configured to store log data internally within said ghost agent and, periodically or at irregular intervals, deposit the log data to a local location, after which the ghost agent clears the ghost log, and said controller configured to accept control signals from an external source and control at least one of a life-span of said ghost agent and system resources used by said ghost agent; at least one data-reaping object for retrieving log data stored at the local location and conveying the retrieved log data to a ghost log repository; a customer service application configured to register the plurality of hosts for performing host-based operations to determine actions leading to at least one problem utilizing the at least one associated ghost agent and to convey control signals for synchronizing a plurality of ghost agents for performing customer service operations on one of the plurality of hosts, the customer service application having a service interface configured to prevent unauthorized access to the customer service application, wherein at least a portion of said hosts move from one grid within said grid environment to another grid, and wherein said ghost agents responsively move from said one grid to said another grid in response to movement of said associated host.