Patent ID: 7200662

Claim:
A network administration system for configuring a data center that provides network content services to a plurality of subscribers of different companies, the network administration system comprising: an administration server comprising: (i) a plurality of service objects having object properties that provide network service definitions for the network services provided by the data center to the subscribers of the different companies, (ii) a plurality of address objects having object properties that define address information for the network services provided by the data center to the subscribers; and (iii) a plurality of sets of implied rules, wherein each one of the sets of implied rules defines a configuration of one of the network content services, wherein each rule in the set of implied rules comprises at least one of the service objects and at least one of the address objects; and a client computer executing a configuration engine that presents a user Interface, wherein the user interface allows the subscriber to configure a respective subset of the network services provided by the data center, wherein, in response to a configuration change to a first one of the network content services by one of the subscribers, the configuration engine automatically modifies an address object or a service object of a rule in the set of implied rules that defines the configuration of the first one of the network content services, wherein, at least one rule in the set of implied rules defines configuration of a second one of the network content services and includes the modified address object or service object, and wherein the configuration engine automatically modifies a configuration of the first one of the network content services and automatically modifies a configuration of the second one of the network content services when the modification to the address object or the service object is reflected in all rules in the sets of implied rules that include the modified address object or the modified service object.