US 12,293,176 B2
Version history based upgrade testing across simulated information technology environments
Parminder Singh Sethi, Ludhiana (IN); Shelesh Chopra, Bangalore (IN); and Kanika Kapish, Muzaffarnagar (IN)
Assigned to Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX (US)
Filed by Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX (US)
Filed on Jan. 7, 2022, as Appl. No. 17/570,425.
Prior Publication US 2023/0221939 A1, Jul. 13, 2023
Int. Cl. G06F 8/65 (2018.01); G06F 8/61 (2018.01); G06F 9/455 (2018.01)
CPC G06F 8/65 (2013.01) [G06F 8/61 (2013.01); G06F 9/45558 (2013.01); G06F 2009/45591 (2013.01)] 16 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A method for version history based upgrade testing, the method comprising:
receiving, by an analysis farm and from a product development environment, a version installation package for a product version of an enterprise information technology (IT) product;
making a determination that the product version represents a subsequent version;
based on the determination:
identifying, using a virtual machine group database of the analysis farm comprising a first entry associated with the enterprise IT product, a virtual machine group mapped to the enterprise IT product, wherein each virtual machine of the virtual machine group is associated with a respective product version installation chain, wherein the product version installation chain is specified in a product database of the analysis farm, wherein a second entry maps the product version to the version installation package;
cloning the virtual machine group to obtain a cloned virtual machine group;
registering the cloned virtual machine group in the first entry with the virtual machine group database;
updating an upgrade history database of the analysis farm by duplicating a second entry of the upgrade history database associated with the virtual machine group to obtain a duplicated entry;
after updating the upgrade history database, reanimating the virtual machine group within a sandbox using the virtual machine group database;
installing, using the version installation package, the product version of the enterprise IT product onto each virtual machine of the virtual machine group, wherein product version is not installed in the cloned virtual machine group, and the cloned virtual machine group serves as a control group;
monitoring the virtual machine group post-installation of the product version;
observing, based on monitoring the virtual machine group, at least one upgrade issue manifesting on at least one virtual machine of the virtual machine group;
tracking the upgrade issue by updating the second entry to store a version identifier of the product version and a description of the upgrade issue;
submitting, to the product development environment, an issue report comprising the at least one upgrade issue;
after submitting the issue report, obtaining a suspended state for each virtual machine of the virtual machine group,
wherein the suspended state for each virtual machine is captured upon completion of a simulation of installing the product version onto each virtual machine of the virtual machine group in the sandbox; and
maintaining the suspended state for each virtual machine of the virtual machine group in the virtual machine group database of the analysis farm,
wherein the issue report further comprises the respective product version installation chain associated with each virtual machine of the at least one virtual machine whereon the at least one upgrade issue manifested, and
wherein the issue report specifies a previous product version in the respective product version corresponding to a previous upgrade issue.