JP2002149437A - Method for restarting software - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To solve such problems that it is not clear whether the generation of a failure of software loaded on a computer is due to the generation of an abnormality of the software itself or the generation of an abnormality of an OS or hardware, and that it is impossible to recover the failure even at the time of restarting the software in the latter case. SOLUTION: Monitor software monitors the state of software to be monitored after the OS starts or while the OS is operating, and when any failure is generated in the software to be monitored, the restart of the software to be monitored and the OS or the reset of hardware is respectively started the designated number of times so that the software can be restored.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a software operation monitoring method and a failure recovery method for a general-purpose computer device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a conventional technique typified by a "software abnormality monitoring method" described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. H10-214208, an external operation using monitoring software is used as a means for recovering an application failure in a computer system. Monitor the status of the application inside,
There is a method of restarting the application when an abnormality occurs.
When the application is restarted by these conventional techniques, it is possible to cope with the abnormal state of the running application itself. However, other software or hardware such as a memory, a CPU state, and an input / output device can be used. Is abnormal and the application is abnormal because the OS or the system is abnormal, it is not possible to recover the normal state even if only the abnormal application is restarted.

[0003]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION According to the present invention, in a computer system, when the operating state of a certain software is abnormal due to a failure of the OS, other software or hardware, the software is re-installed. Aims at recovering from computer system failure by providing a boot method.

[0004]

According to the present invention, the operation state of software is monitored using software for monitoring whether the software is operating. If the monitored software (hereinafter referred to as “monitored software”) does not operate after startup or enters an abnormal state, the monitored software is restarted a specified number of times and restarted. If the monitored software is not started even after the activation, the OS is restarted or the terminal device is rebooted, so that not only the monitored software but also other software, a hardware reset of a memory, an input / output device, and the like are performed. Alternatively, this problem is solved by performing a restart or the like to return not only the monitored software but also the entire system to an initial normal state.

[0005]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a software structure diagram of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a monitoring software information table, FIG. 3 is a flowchart of a status monitoring function of monitored software, and FIG.
FIG. 5 is a flow chart of software monitoring by the monitored software at the time of OS startup and a process of restarting the software and restarting the OS, and FIG. 5 is a flowchart of OS restart determination processing in FIG. FIG. 6 is a flow chart of the monitored software operating state monitoring process in FIG.

First, each element constituting the monitoring software according to the present invention will be described.

FIG. 1 is a software structure diagram of an embodiment of the present invention. In FIG. 1, monitoring software 110
Indicates the software information table 111 and the status monitoring function 11
5 is comprised. In the shared memory 120, the monitored software name area 121 and the status information 122 are paired, and there are as many as the number of the monitored software 110. The monitored software 130 sets its own software name in the monitored software name area 121 existing in the shared memory 120 at the time of startup. The name set here is a unique name in the system. The status information 122 is an area where the monitored software 130 sets the status. The status monitoring function 115 is a function of monitoring the monitored software 130 based on the monitored software name area 121 and the status information 122. The monitoring method will be described later.

FIG. 2 shows details of the software information table 111 according to an embodiment of the present invention. Information of each table is stored in a non-volatile medium such as a disk device.
All information in each table is monitored software 130
There are as many as.

The software information table 111 stores the execution program path 2 using the monitored software name 200 as a key.
It is a table for updating a set value of 01, each timer, the number of restarts, a counter update, and a counter. The monitored software name 200 contains the monitored software 1
30 names are set. This name sets the same value as that of the shared memory 122. In the execution program path 201, an execution program path 201 which is information indicating a storage location of the execution program corresponding to the monitored software name 200 in a hard disk device or the like is set. This information is set every time when restarting. A wait time from when the monitoring software 110 is started to when the state monitoring of the monitored software 130 is started is set in the start waiting monitoring timer 202. This time is also used as a wait time until restart of the monitored software 130 after the monitored software 130 has failed to start monitoring the status of the monitored software 130. In the operating monitoring timer 203, when the monitored software that is operating stops operating due to some failure and continues to be in that state, the time until the software becomes a non-response state and is determined to be timed out is set.
The restart monitoring timer 204 includes the monitored software 130
Set the waiting time before restarting status monitoring after restarting. The number of restarts 205 of the monitored software 130 when the failure of the monitored software 130 occurs is set in the restart failure count 205 at the time of starting failure. Number of restarts during operation failure 206
When the monitored software 130 stops operating due to some failure, the monitored software 130
Set the number of times to restart. The number of restarts of OS at the time of startup failure 207 sets how many times the OS is restarted if the monitored software 130 fails to start even if the monitored software 130 does not operate even after restarting the set number of times.
If the monitored software 130 that is operating does not operate due to some kind of failure and the monitored software 130 does not operate even after restarting the set number of times, the number of times to restart the OS Set.

For the monitored software 130 that does not require the monitored software 130 to be restarted, 0 (zero) may be set in the restart failure count 205 when the startup fails and the restart count 206 when the failure occurs during operation. For the monitored software 130 that does not require an OS restart, the OS restart count 207 when startup fails and the OS
The number of S restarts 208 may be set to 0.

The start wait monitoring timer counter 212 stores the timer value obtained from the start wait monitoring timer 202 and the active monitoring timer counter 213 stores the active monitoring timer 203
The timer value obtained from the restart monitoring timer counter 2
Reference numeral 14 denotes a work area for maintaining and updating the timer value acquired from the restart monitoring timer 204. The restart failure count counter 215 at the time of start failure indicates the number of restarts acquired from the restart count 205 at the time of start failure.
6 is a work area for maintaining and updating the number of restarts acquired from No. 6. Further, the OS restart number counter 217 at the time of boot failure indicates the number of OS restarts obtained from the OS restart number 207 at the time of boot failure, and the OS restart number counter 218 at the time of operating failure indicates the OS restart number 208 at the time of operating failure.
This is a work area for maintaining and updating the number of OS restarts acquired from the OS.

The boot waiting OS restart flag 221 is an area for setting a flag as to whether or not the OS restarted by the monitored software 130 at the time of starting the OS. The operating OS restart flag 222 is
This area is used to set a flag indicating whether or not the monitored software 130 has restarted the OS when the OS is started. Note that the initial values of the startup waiting OS restart flag 221 and the operating OS restart flag 222 are off.

The error information 231 is stored in the monitoring software 11
Reference numeral 0 denotes an area for storing information indicating that a failure of the monitored software 130 has been detected and that the monitored software 130 and the OS have been restarted.

In the time zone information 232, a date, a time, and a time zone in which the monitored software 130 is to be operated are set in advance, and the monitored software that is not operating on the specified date, time, and time zone is set. Software 130
Is an area in which information for starting the monitoring software 110 is set.

The above is an explanation of the elements constituting the monitoring software 110 which is an example of the present invention.

A method by which the monitoring software 110 determines the state of the monitored software 130 will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. First, terms are defined. Here, “operating” indicates a state in which the monitored software 130 is operating normally. Stopped means monitored software 1
30 indicates a state in which it has not been started. The failure indicates a state in which the monitored software 130 has become unresponsive due to some kind of failure.

After being started, the monitored software 130 sets its own software name in the monitored software name area 121. Thereafter, an arbitrary value is set in the status information 122 periodically or in response to a request from the monitoring software 110.

The monitoring software 110 waits for a certain period of time (300) and then reads the monitored software name area (301) to periodically monitor the status of the monitored software 130 after it has been started up. It is checked whether the software name of the software 130 is registered (302). If it is not registered, the monitored software 130 to be monitored is stopped.
The process returns to the standby for a fixed time (300). This operation is repeated while the monitored software 130 is stopped. When the name of the monitored software 130 is registered, it means that the monitored software 130 is operating (303). The monitoring software 110 is the monitored software 1
If it is determined that the monitoring software 30 is operating, the status information of the monitored software 130 is confirmed (304). At this time, the setting of the status information 122 by the monitored software 130 may be a periodic setting of the monitored software 130 or a method in which the monitoring software 110 requests the monitored software 130 to set the status information 122.
If any value is not set in the status determination (305) of the status information 122 by the monitoring software 110, the monitored software 130 is in a no-response (308) status.
If an arbitrary value is set in the status information 122, the monitored software 130 is operating and responding (30
6), and the monitoring software 110 clears the status information to a value other than an arbitrary value (307). As above,
The monitoring software 110 includes the monitored software 130
Monitor the status of.

The above is the information for explaining the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 shows software monitoring by the monitored software at the time of OS startup, restarting of the software, and OS
It is a flowchart which shows a restart process. The operation of the monitoring software 110 according to the present invention will be specifically described with reference to FIG.

First, a software monitoring method at the time of starting the OS will be described. After the OS startup (400), the monitoring software 110 and the monitored software 130 respectively
It is assumed that the monitoring software 110 is software that is automatically started by the OS, and that the monitoring software 110 is started (401) before the monitored software 130. The monitoring software 110 performs the OS restart determination process after startup (40
In 2), the flag states of the boot waiting OS restart flag 221 and the operating OS restart flag 222 are checked, and it is determined whether or not the OS restart by the monitoring software 110 has been executed (402). In this embodiment, the initial value of each flag is off. A monitoring timer is set after the OS starts until the monitored software 130 starts (403), and the number of times the monitored software 130 is restarted when the monitored software fails to start is set (404). The monitored software 130 checks the monitored software name area 121 to determine whether the monitored software 130 is operating (405), and if the monitored software 130 is operating, turns off the OS waiting flag for booting OS (406). Then, the monitoring process of the monitored software 130 transitions to the monitored software operating state monitoring process (407).

Based on the result of checking whether the monitored software 130 is operating (405), the monitored software 130
If is not activated, the value of the activation wait monitoring timer counter 212 is updated (408). After the OS is started, it is determined whether or not the start waiting monitoring timer counter 212 of the monitored software has timed out (409). If the timer counter value is 1 or more, the process proceeds to the monitored software in-operation determination processing (405) to continue monitoring. When the value of the start wait monitoring timer counter 212 is less than 1, since the start wait timeout has occurred, it is determined whether or not the restart failure counter 215 when the start of the monitored software 130 fails is 0 or less (0) (410). If the value is 1 or more, the monitored software 130 is restarted (411), and the restart failure counter 215 when the startup fails
Is updated (412). As described above, the recovery process of the monitored software 130 is performed.

If the value of the restart failure counter 217 at the time of the failure of the monitored software 130 being failed is 0, it is determined whether or not to restart from the OS (413). If the OS restart count counter 217 is 0 when the monitored software 130 fails to start, error processing is performed, the monitored software 200 and the error information 231 are stored in the error information table 114, and the monitoring of the monitored software 130 ends. . If the OS restart counter at the time of boot failure is 1 or more, the boot wait OS restart flag is turned on (41
4) After that, the OS restart count counter 217 at the time of boot failure is updated (415), the OS termination process (416) is performed, and the OS restart (400) executes the OS restart and hardware reset to execute the OS restart and hardware reset. Perform recovery. As described above, when the monitored software 130 is restarted from the restart of the OS, the monitored software 130 becomes abnormal not only because of the monitored software itself but also because of the OS or hardware abnormality. Even if an error occurs, the method of the present invention is advantageous in that the monitored software can be recovered because the cause of a temporary failure of the OS, software, and hardware can be reset by restarting the OS and resetting the hardware. is there.

When the number of restarts 207 at the time of starting failure and the number of times of restarting the OS at the time of starting failure 208 are set to 0 or not restarted, only the forced termination of the monitored software 130 is performed.

FIG. 5 shows an OS restart determination process according to the embodiment of the present invention. When the monitoring software 110 detects that the monitored software 130 has failed to start due to some failure after the OS has started, and restarts the OS, the OS is restarted after setting the on-boot OS restart flag to ON (414). Therefore, after the OS is restarted, the startup waiting OS restart flag is turned off (501). When the normal OS startup or the normal OS restart is performed, the initial value of the boot waiting OS restart flag 221 remains off, so that when the startup fails, O
The OS restart count 207 at the time of startup failure is set in the S restart count counter 217 (504).

When the monitoring software 110 detects an abnormality of the monitored software 130 due to some failure after the monitored software 130 operates and restarts the OS, the operating OS restart flag 222 is set to ON (611), Since the OS has been restarted, the OS restart flag is turned off (503) during the operation of the monitored software. When the normal OS is started or the normal OS is restarted, the initial value of the operating OS restart flag 222 is kept off, so that the operating failure OS restart number counter 218 stores the operating OS restart number of times. 208 is set (505).

FIG. 6 shows a status monitoring process during operation of the monitored software in the embodiment of the present invention. During the operation of the monitored software 130, the number of restarts during operation failure 206 is set in the number of restart during operation failure counter 216 (60
0), and sets the running monitoring timer 203 to the running monitoring timer counter 203 (601), and then determines whether the monitored software 130 is running (602).
Confirm with 2. If the monitored software 130 is operating, whether or not the monitoring of the monitoring software 110 has ended (6.
03), and repeatedly checks whether the monitored software 130 is operating. As a result of checking the status information 122, it is determined whether the monitored software is operating. If not in operation, the monitoring timer value during operation is updated (604). When the value of the monitoring timer counter during operation of the monitored software is 1 or more, the process waits for n seconds (609), and transitions to the monitoring software operating determination process (602). If the status of the monitored software is longer than the monitoring timer time and is not running, the status of the monitored software is determined to be faulty or stopped. It is determined whether or not it is 0 or less than 0 (606), and if it is 1 or more,
The monitored software name area is cleared, and the monitored software is restarted (607). Thereafter, the number of restarts counter during operation failure is updated (608).

If the value of the failure restart counter during operation of the monitored software 130 is 0, it is determined whether or not to restart from the OS (610). When the operating failure restart counter 218 is equal to or greater than 1 After the operating OS restart flag is turned on (611), the operating restart counter 218 is updated (612) and the operating restart flag is reset (612).
An S end process (613) is performed and an OS startup (400) is performed.

As described above, the monitored software 130
Cause the monitored software 130 to become abnormal by restarting the OS and the OS.
If the monitored software 130 becomes abnormal not only due to itself but also due to the OS or hardware abnormality,
The method of the present invention is advantageous because a cause such as a temporary failure of S, software, or hardware can be reset by restarting the OS and performing a hardware reset. If the number of restarts 207 at the time of unsuccessful startup and the number of restarts of the OS at the time of unsuccessful boot 208 are set to 0 or not to be restarted, only forced termination of the monitored software 130 is performed.

Next, in the case of the monitored software 130 which needs to be activated at a certain date or a fixed time or time, the date, time and time zone are set in advance in the time zone information 232, and the monitoring of the monitored software 130 is started. The time zone information 232 is used. For example, in the flowchart of FIG. 3, during the operation of the monitored software (405)
When the operation is not in operation, the current date / time or time is compared with the time zone information 232 of the monitored software, and if it is the relevant date / time or time, the monitored software restart processing (411) is executed. Further, after the monitored software 130 is already running, if the monitored software is not running in the monitoring software running determination (602) in the flowchart of FIG. 6, the time zone information 232 is determined and the monitored software 130 is restarted ( 607).

[0032]

According to the present invention, in a computer system, if software is not started when the OS is started or the running software is not running, the software failure is recovered by restarting the software and restarting the OS. It is possible to do.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a software structure diagram of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an information table in monitoring software.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart of a status monitoring function of monitored software.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart of software monitoring by monitored software at the time of OS startup, and the software restart and OS restart processing.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart of an OS restart determination process.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart of a monitored software operating state monitoring process.

[Explanation of symbols]

110: monitoring software, 111: software information table, 115: status monitoring function, 120: shared memory, 130: monitored software, 140: OS (operating system), 150: hardware

 ──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continued on the front page (72) Inventor Toshikazu Umeto 1 Ikegami, Haruoka-cho, Owariasahi-shi, Aichi Prefecture Inside the Information Equipment Division, Hitachi, Ltd. F-term in the Information Technology Division of Hitachi, Ltd. (reference) 5B027 AA04 CC02 5B042 GA23 GC15 JJ15 JJ23

Claims (3)

[Claims] In a system comprising an OS and a plurality of software operating on the OS, the software having a function of monitoring the activation state of the software, detecting software that is not activated within a predetermined time, and restarting the software. A software restart method characterized by monitoring whether software to be started at the time of startup is started, and restarting the software or the OS when the software is not started. 2. A system comprising an OS and a plurality of software operating on the OS, the OS having a function of monitoring an operating state of the software, detecting software that does not respond within a predetermined time, and restarting the software. It monitors the operating state of software that needs to be continuously running after startup, and restarts the software or the OS if the software stops or becomes unresponsive due to a failure or the like. How to restart the software. 3. In a system comprising an OS and a plurality of software operating on the OS, a date, time and time zone for executing the software are managed, and the software is executed on a designated date, time and time zone. A software operation monitoring method for monitoring an operation state of software by a software having a function of starting and a function of detecting and starting software that is not operating at a designated date, time, and time zone.