Problem prevention on a computer system in a service network of computer systems.

摘要

A service network has several computer systems connected together. A computer system can either be a "Service Requestor" (SR) (110), a "Service Provider" (SP) (150), or a hybrid of the two, a "Service Provider/Requestor" (SP/R) (130). The computer systems in the service network have the capability to perform or request problem prevention. A SP (or SP/R acting as a SP) can check to see if it has any solutions to problems that one or more of the SRs (or SP/R acting as an SR) it supports has but has not discovered or reported yet. If so, it can distribute solution information, accompanied by one or more software components, microcode components, hardware parts order, and/or textual instructions, to the SRs. In addition, a SR (or SP/R acting as an SR) can request any known fixes to problems for a list of supported components from an SP (or SP/R acting as an SP). The SP sends any fixes to problems associated with the list of supported components to the requesting SR. <IMAGE>