Patent Document

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     The present invention relates to the network management of local and wide area networks. Specifically, a system and method are provided which will identify connections of users to a network for purposes of billing and diagnosing failures on the network. 
     The power of computing has been greatly expanded by the ability to network individual users with other digital devices located in the same or different facilities. In a typical local area or wide area network system, users are connected and disconnected from the network on an ongoing basis. The network topology therefore changes, so that it becomes increasingly more difficult to identify the users of a network and their particular port connection to the network. In order to effectively diagnose problems on the network, as well as provide appropriate billing to users of the network, it is necessary to know, on at least a monthly basis, user port connections. 
     Network trouble shooting is typically done by the technician employees of the network owner. When diagnosing problems on the network, a networking problem may be traced to a particular physical address of a device connected to the network. The identification of the user of the equipment having to the physical address involved in a network problem, however, is not immediately available. Locating a network port location of a particular user is even more difficult in an environment where users may move from office to office, or even building to building over time, so that connectivity information is constantly changing. Further, various sources of user information are often in different data bases, and not correlated to a user&#39;s network port connection. For instance, in a typical wide area network configuration, separate data bases may be maintained, one which identifies an employee&#39;s organizational information, i.e., department number, telephone number, and employee number, etc., and other data bases which may include authorization data and address information for the users, which are not linked to each other, making it difficult to learn all facts about a user&#39;s connection to the network. 
     Accordingly, the present invention seeks to merge user connectivity data which is dynamic, in that it changes from day to day, with more static data located in various data bases which are maintained by the network manager. 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     The invention is directed to a system and method which collects dynamic connectivity data from an area network interconnecting multiple computing devices. The dynamic connectivity information is combined in a data warehouse with static network information, relating to the various users and their privileges. The combined data stored in a data warehouse permits the identification of each user and the various privileges of the user, correlated to its connection port. 
     The productivity data is collected using commands in the simple network management protocol (SNMP). SNMP commands query all network devices such as hubs, routers, and gateways to other networks to obtain port connectivity information such as the identity of the ports being used by each network user. 
     The dynamic connectivity data may be combined in a single data warehouse with static user information from other data bases, correlated to the collected dynamic information. Thus, every user of the system may be identified along with ports in use by the user, and any privileges which exist for the user to use other connected devices such as gateways to other networks. 
    
    
     DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
     FIG. 1 is an overall architectural representation of a network; 
     FIG.  2 A and FIG. 2B illustrates a collection routine BNGETARP.CMD for identifying routers on the network; 
     FIG. 3 illustrates the collection routine GET.ARP.CMD for collecting connectivity data from each router; 
     FIG. 4 illustrates the collection routine MAKEHUB.CMD for obtaining hub connectivity data from each network hub; 
     FIG. 5 illustrates the MONTHLY routine which creates a single file from connectivity data obtained by the collection routines; and 
     FIG. 6 illustrates the process run on the mainframe computer  26  which merges the connectivity data with static data. 
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
     The area network illustrated in FIG. 1 includes a first segment  11 , shown as a ring, connected to a first hub  15  and a second hub  17 . The illustrated hubs  15 ,  17  in the embodiment of FIG. 1 are standard IBM 8250 and 8230 hubs which connect a plurality of workstations, such as stand alone computers  18  and  19  to the network. 
     The first segment,  11  is connected by the router  13  to a second segment  12 . The first segment  11  may reside in a given building or facility, whereas the second segment  12  may be in another building or facility. The router, as is known in standard network architecture, provides a bridge from the first segment  11  to the second segment  12  for transferring data between segments  11  and  12 . 
     Segment  12  is connected to a controller  24 , such as an IBM 3745 communications controller which comprises a gateway to a main frame SNA network  25 . Communications over the SNA network  25  utilize the SNA protocol, and the identity of any workstation having privileges to communicate over the SNA network  25  is stored as an SNA XID within a table of SNA database  33 , along with a physical or MAC address for the authorized workstation. The SNA XID provides the alternative identity of the workstations which is used in the SNA network  25 , and a data translation occurs between the SNA XID and the MAC address which is used on the network segment  12  by controller  24 . 
     Other facilities connected to the network of FIG. 1 include a network manager  27 , printer  16 , dumb terminal  30  and diagnostic terminal  21 . In the preferred embodiment, the network manager  27  keeps a router list containing the community name for the router, as well as the router MAC address,which is used in the collection process for obtaining connectivity data from each router. 
     The system according to FIG. 1 is capable of collecting connectivity data from each of the devices connected to the area network, and merging the connectivity data with static data representing user identities and network privileges maintained in each of the data bases  31 ,  32  and  33 . For instance, the SNA XID data base  33  identifies the physical address in the SNA protocol form of each user (identified by an employee number) that has privileges for communicating over the mainframe SNA network  25  as well as the respective SNA XID. The name server data base  32  maintains a list of all users, according to their employee serial numbers, their TCP/IP addresses, an associated MAC address as well as a machine and node on which the user can be found. Where fields within the name server file contain a customer&#39;s name or machine description, a billing field may be provided to identify either a serial number or department number that the machine is registered to. A cable number field contains the cable number that an end user has identified as being connected to his machine. 
     A CALLUP data base  31  contains the lowest level of information about each user of the network. A field within the CALLUP data base contains the employee&#39;s serial number which correlates the information of each record stored in the CALLUP data base to data in the name server data base  32  and SNA data base  33 . Each record identifies the employee by name, the division in which the employee works as well as his department. An employee&#39;s manager&#39;s serial number may also be included in this record. 
     The system in accordance with FIG. 1 collects the dynamic port connection information for each connection to the network. A user is connected to the network through a network card which has a unique physical, or MAC address. As connections change due to employee relocations, new employees joining the system, and deletion of employees who leave the organization owning the network, periodic updates of connectivity information is necessary so that current connection information is available for billing and diagnostic purposes. As will be described, a system for collecting this dynamic data is provided using a series of SNMP (simple network management protocol) collection components which identify equipment connected to the network by their respective MAC addresses. 
     The present invention merges the dynamic connection data obtained through the SNMP collection components with the static data in each of the static data bases, and stores the merged data in a data warehouse  28  of a mainframe computer  26  on SNA network  25 . The data warehouse  28  provides a data base identifying each connection to a port of the network by employee, employee department and manager, and all other pertinent information for billing purposes. Each record of the data base in data warehouse  28  in a preferred embodiment of the invention may be in the following format: 
     
       
         
               
               
               
             
           
               
                   
               
               
                 Starting 
                   
                   
               
               
                 Column 
                 Field 
                 Information 
               
               
                   
               
             
             
               
                 @1 
                 MACADDR 
                 Network Interface Card (NIC) address - The 
               
               
                   
                   
                 common key to all the data 
               
               
                 @15 
                 SEG 
                 LAN Segment Number of which the MAC 
               
               
                   
                   
                 ADDR is part 
               
               
                 @18 
                 HUB 
                 Intelligent Hub Name that the MAC ADDR 
               
               
                   
                   
                 was seen on (MACS) 
               
               
                 @34 
                 PORT 
                 Port on the Intelligent Hub (MACS) 
               
               
                 @40 
                 TERMID 
                 SNA Terminal ID (SNADB) 
               
               
                 @50 
                 XID 
                 SNA XID (from VTAM and SNADB) 
               
               
                 @60 
                 SNAMNUM 
                 Employee Number of the owner of the SNA 
               
               
                   
                   
                 TERMID (SNADB) 
               
               
                 @70 
                 SNADEPT 
                 Department Number derived from 
               
               
                   
                   
                 SNAMNUM and CALLUP 
               
               
                 @80 
                 IPADDR 
                 TCP/IP Address that was seen on the router 
               
               
                   
                   
                 (NEWARP) 
               
               
                 @95 
                 MACHNAME 
                 TCP/IP machine from the Name Server 
               
               
                   
                   
                 (NEWNAME) 
               
               
                 @110 
                 MANNUM 
                 Employee Number recorded in the Name 
               
               
                   
                   
                 Server (NEWNAME) 
               
               
                 @120 
                 NETBMACH 
                 Netbios Machine Name (NETBIOS) 
               
               
                 @130 
                 REQSERV 
                 If the machine is a Netbios REQuester or 
               
               
                   
                   
                 SERVer (NETBIOS) 
               
               
                 @135 
                 NBDOMAIN 
                 The Netbios Domain that the machine is part 
               
               
                   
                   
                 of (NETBIOS) 
               
               
                 @155 
                 EMPNAME 
                 The Employee Name derived from 
               
               
                   
                   
                 SNAMNUM and/or MANNUM (CALLUP) 
               
               
                 @195 
                 DEPT 
                 the department number that the employee is 
               
               
                   
                   
                 part of (CALLUP) 
               
               
                 @200 
                 DIV 
                 The Division of the department that the 
               
               
                   
                   
                 employee is part of (CALLUP) 
               
               
                 @205 
                 MACS 
                 FLAG for as to if some of the above data 
               
               
                   
                   
                 came from MACS file 
               
               
                 @207 
                 NEWARP 
                 FLAG for as to if some of the above data 
               
               
                   
                   
                 came from NEWARP file 
               
               
                 @209 
                 VTAM 
                 FLAG for as to if some of the above data 
               
               
                   
                   
                 came from VTAM file 
               
               
                 @211 
                 NETBIOS 
                 FLAG for as to if some of the above data 
               
               
                   
                   
                 came from NETBIOS file 
               
               
                 @213 
                 NEWNAME 
                 FLAG for as to if some of the above data 
               
               
                   
                   
                 came from NEWNAME file 
               
               
                 @215 
                 SNADB 
                 FLAG for as to if some of the above data 
               
               
                   
                   
                 came from SNADB file 
               
               
                 @217 
                 EMPID 
                 Information from the COAX file 
               
               
                 @219 
                 PUNAME 
                 Physical Unit Name from the COAX file 
               
               
                 @228 
                 COAXPORT 
                 Coax Port 
               
               
                 @230 
                 DATE 
                 The last date that any of the above 
               
               
                   
                   
                 information was seen on the Network 
               
               
                   
               
             
          
         
       
     
     The above sample record of the data warehouse  28  includes dynamic port data and static user data stored in dedicated fields of the record. The common key to all the data is the MAC address shown in the field beginning with column  1 . From this MAC address, through column  39 , the dynamic connection data for that particular MAC address is shown. Fields beginning with columns  40 ,  50 ,  60  and  70  contain data obtained from the SNA data base  33 . Other information such as the corresponding TCP/IP address obtained from a router is shown for a given MAC address. 
     The static data from the CALLUP data base  31  is shown in fields beginning with column  155  through  204 . Flags in locations at  205  through  215  identify whether some of the data came from the MAC address stored in a file of a component on the network, the work file of the name server  32 , the SNA data base  33 , or from a NETBIOS file. The final field beginning at column  230  identifies the last date that the dynamic connectivity information in the record was found to be on the network. 
     Using conventional data base management software, the compiled data base in warehouse  28  can be used to identify all connection information for a user. Alternatively, in a diagnostic application, the employee having a connection to the network which appears problematic can be identified. 
     The dynamic connectivity information is derived from collection routines (components) stored on computer readable mediums running on different computer terminals using the SNMP protocol with OS/2,—TCP/IP operating systems. The collection routines issue SNMP base values which retrieve information on port connections from selected network components such as hubs, routers, and controller interfaces to other networks such as a SNA network. The collection components are part of a data collection program which runs on a periodic basis, such as once a month, to maintain and update the information relating to port usage by the network users. 
     Each of the devices involved in a connection to the network of FIG. 1 is interrogated for information to derive the identity (MAC address) of users connected to the ports of a device. These collection components include the following: 
     1. BNGETARP.CMD, 
     2. GETHUB.CMD, and 
     3. MAKE HUB.CMD. 
     Collection component BNGETARP.CMD interrogates data base of LAN network manager  27  of FIG. 1 for the router lists, so that data from each router identified in the lists to can be obtained. Similarly, MAKE HUB.CMD is a collection component to create a list for each of the hubs from which data must be collected. 
     The foregoing collection components are executed on the OS/2 port charge machine  18  of FIG.  1 . Additional to these collection components are components which run on the LAN network manager  27  of FIG. 1, as well as the network AIX processor  20  which is dedicated to organize the data recovered from the collection routines. The routines which run on the AIX processor  20  collect and consolidate the data collected by the OS/2 machine, and parse the data removing duplicates. A further routine residing on the AIX processor  20  executes a set of commands for obtaining the printer connection data for each printer connected to a port of the local area network. The result is a file of collected data which is reformatted, and validated for merging into the data warehouse  28 . 
     Other collection components run on the mainframe machine  26  of the SNA network  25  along with a program available from the International Business Machines Corporation identified as Netview/390. These collection components BTVUFC and CUUSCA, collect the SNA data for identifying users of the SNA network  25  who are connected to ports of the area network. The recovered data includes data specific to the 3745 communication controller  24 , along with MAC addresses and SNA resource information for all devices using the 3745 network controller. Additionally, the CUUSCA component obtains port usage information from any 3174 cluster controllers  29  connected to the network. 
     The identity of each router is maintained within the network manager  27  of the network. The collection routine BNGETARP.CMD acquires a list of routers for the network from the network manager, which has this information compiled as a router list. Once the router list is obtained, BNGETARP.CMD invokes another collection routine, GETARP.CMD which collects from each router the router&#39;s media table containing the identity of all MAC addresses for devices which are served by the router, and their corresponding TCP/IP address. The two collection routines BNGETARP.CMD and GETARP.CMD are shown in FIGS. 2 and 3. 
     Referring now to FIG. 2, the beginning of the BNGETARP.CMD collection routine is shown at  40 . As the program is run by the OS/2 machine  18 , on a periodic basis, steps  39 - 41  determine when it is time to collect the router information. The various file path counters are set in step  42  to permit the collection process to begin. Steps  43  and  44  determine whether or not the program has been restarted, or whether it is continuing to run from an earlier initiation phase. 
     Step  46  determines whether or not the information contained in the router list of the network manager has been updated. Steps  47 - 48  result in a replacement of the old router list with the new router list bearing an update. 
     The process of collecting MAC addresses and the corresponding TCP/IP addresses from the read router list, begins by calling the collection routine GETARP.CMD  54 . The router list is read line by line, beginning in step  49 , and the router address, name and type for locating the router is identified in step  52 . As will be seen with respect to FIG. 3, the GETARP.CMD collection routine  54  reads from each router identified in the router list the connectivity data comprising MAC addresses and corresponding TCP/IP addresses for all connected devices served by the router. 
     The results obtained from invoking GETARP.CMD are concatenated and parsed in step  56  to remove duplicates and any gaps which may appear in the data. The new data is written in step  57  as NEWARP.TDT. 
     The number of records within NEWARP.DAY, NEWARP.TDT and ARPFILE.OUT, which have been compiled from the recovered information, are written to a log  60 . If the current value of the NEWARP.TDT information is greater than NEWARP.DAY which was stored previously as determined in  64 , NEWARP.TDT is written in step  62 , and an indication of the rewriting of NEWARP.TDT is made in step  63 . In the event that the copying of NEWARP.TDT to NEWARP.DAY has not been accomplished, step  64  logs that information. 
     The GETARP.CMD collection routine is shown more particularly in FIG.  3 . When invoked, it parses the TCP/IP address, the router name and router type in step  81 . The file directory is set up in step  82  prior to recovering the information from each router. 
     Decision block  83  recognizes a condition where all routers may not be the same, and some may require a different community name in order to execute the SNMP command for interrogating the media tables in the router. Depending on the type of router, steps  84  and  89  will set the appropriate community name in order to recover the information stored in each router media table. 
     The routine continues by sending the restart information to a log in step  85 , and then collects the router internal MAC ID and TCP/IP addresses in step  86 . The media table for the router, comprising a table identifying the MAC addresses and TCP/IP addresses of all network devices utilizing the routers are then collected by the OS/2 machine. 
     Other significant port information is obtained using the MAKEHUB.CMD collection routine of FIG.  4 . Each of the hubs having an output port connected to a device with a MAC address is interrogated with the MAAEHUB.CMD collection routine, and each user&#39;s MAC address connected to the hub is recovered by the OS/2 machine. 
     In step  100 , an operating system command NSLOOKUP is executed in order to obtain a list of hubs which is stored in the name server data base  32  of FIG.  1 . The recovered list, representing a dump of name server records, is recovered by the OS/2 machine and stored as NAMESERV.HUB. 
     From the list of hubs, each line is read in step  101  to identify each hub from which the data is to be recovered. In step  104 , the hub type and community name for the hubs are determined from the read lines. 
     The SNMP management system uses in step  105  an SNMP MIB value to identify a data location within the hub having the segment identification and MAC address of the devices and the respectively connected hub port in step  106 . The recovered bit value is written to HUBFILE.SRC in step  107  residing in the OS/2 machine  18 . 
     Thus, following execution of MAC HUB.CMD all of the hubs have been interrogated and the connection data identifying the MAC address connected to each port is written to a file where they can be read or later merged with other information to identify users of ports on the network. 
     Other collection routines running on the OS/2 machine  18  will recover yet other port connectivity data. Por instance, a NETLMN.CMD collection routine may be used, similar to BNGETARP.CMD and GETHUB.CMD to collect the port data stored in the network manager. THE NETLMN.CMD routine issues a remote SNMP command to the network manager to execute an STL command for obtaining the contents of the network manager table. This information is stored as a file LNMLIST.SRC,and eventually merged with the collected data from other devices on the network. A similar collection routine may be used to collect the MAC address for any printer  16  connected to the network. 
     The collected data is stored using the NFS command on the AIX machine  20  of FIG. 1, as well as the OS/2 machine  18 . Once a month the routine of FIG. 5 is run, which sorts and concatenates the information which has been collected. Additionally, it collects from the SNA controller  24  the VTAM data identifying each TCP/IP address of all devices on the SNA network  25 . 
     At the start of each month in step  115 , the monthly routine of FIG. 5, is run on the AIX machine  20  which concatenates and stores the files obtained by the collection processes. This includes sorting in step  116  hub list information to create tmt/MAC. In step  117 , the NEWARP table containing port data obtained from the various hubs are stored in a temporary file tmp/NEWARP. The information from SNA controller  24  is collected in step  118  and concatenated and stored as a file tmp/VTAM in step  119 . The SNA data base files recovered from the routine executed in step  119  are stored as tmp/SNAB. 
     The collected data is now available on the AIX machine in a format which can be merged with the static data appearing in data bases  31 ,  32  and  33 . 
     The collected dynamic information constituting the identity of connections to the network is then merged with the static information from data bases  31 ,  32  and  33  into a single database of data warehouse  28  stored on a main frame computer of the SNA network  25  as shown in FIG.  6 . The process combines the connectivity data including MAC address and port connections on all of the hubs, collected in  150  with the NEWARP data from the router, VTAM data from controller  24  and printers  16 . The sets of data representing the different devices which have used the network are merged in a single file in step  156  by a process carried out on the main frame machine  26  of the SNA network  28 . 
     The MAC address data collected from the hubs in  150  identifies each user connected to a respective hub. The user information from the hubs is updated in  151  with any information from the NEWARP  151  file, which was recovered from each of the routers. While the NEWARP data may also include addresses which do not appear connected to any hub, these addresses will form a separate record within the merged data file  156 . 
     Additionally, the data recovered from the VTAM controller  24  shown as VTAM  152  will identify the TCP/IP address of those users recovered from the VTAM controller  24  utilized the network. Any SNA identification information such as the SNA XID of the user will be noted for the recovered MAC address. 
     Other information collected from the network, such as the identification of the connection of printers  27  by their MAC address in  153 , is combined with the merged data  156 . The merged data  156  represents an inventory of all of the network connected devices stored as records of each MAC address for the device. 
     The merged connectivity data  156  is then in accordance with the process carried out on the main frame computer  26  merged with data from the main server database  32  in step  157 , SNA database  33  in step  158 , and the CALLUP database  31  in step  155 . The main server database  32  NEWNAME file identifies for each device connected to the network a TCP/IP address as well as the identity of the user. The identity of the user may for instance be an employee serial number and the MAC address for the employee representing his network interface card. The records obtained from merging all the devices in accordance with their MAC address in step  156  is further merged with the employee serial number from the NEWNAME file having the same MAC address as is contained in the NEWNAME file. 
     The information from the SNA database  33  is then merged with the records merged from the NEWNAME database  32 . The merger occurs in step  158  under control of the main frame machine  26 . The SNA XID&#39;s are checked to identify any MAC address having a SNA XID, as well as other information such as a PU name from the SNA database  33 . The SNA database  33  is organized according to the TCP/IP address, and the employee identification number. The SNA database organizes information according to the employee identification number, which is now contained in each record following the merger of the NEWNAME database  32  in step  157 . The SNA XID address is therefore included in each record in step  158 , along with any other information pertaining to the user stored in the SNA database  33 . 
     Finally, the data contained in the CALLUP database  31  is merged in step  155  with the previous information of the name server database  32 , and SNA database  33 . The CALLUP database  31  includes records of each employee&#39;s serial number, containing the telephone number for the employee, his department or division number, and possibly a supervisor identification. As the records obtained in step  158  include the employee&#39;s number as well, they may be updated with employee serial number information to derive a final record in step  155  which is that shown in Table 1 of the present application. The merged information is stored in the data warehouse  28  representing an entire inventory of all devices which are connected to the network. The information may thereafter be used to identify, during any diagnostic troubleshooting the owner of any particular device having a MAC address which presents a problem, as well as the other information for this MAC address, such as its port connection, the identity of the hub or router serving the user, and any other privileges which are noted in the database record. Billing or accountability information may be derived from the data warehouse  28  by sorting in accordance with each employee identification number the number of MAC addresses connected to the network. 
     The foregoing description of the invention illustrates and describes the present invention. Additionally, the disclosure shows and describes only the preferred embodiments of the invention, but as aforementioned, it is to be understood that the invention is capable of use in various other combinations, modifications, and environments and is capable of changes or modifications within the scope of the inventive concept as expressed herein, commensurate with the above teachings, and/or the skill or knowledge of the relevant art. The embodiments described hereinabove are further intended to explain best modes known of practicing the invention and to enable others skilled in the art to utilize the invention in such, or other, embodiments and with the various modifications required by the particular applications or uses of the invention. Accordingly, the description is not intended to limit the invention to the form disclosed herein. Also, it is intended that the appended claims be construed to include alternative embodiments.

Technology Category: 5