| Summary: | Automated system management solutions aim to reduce the pressure on the administrators of complex, large-scale, distributed systems by enabling the automation of many of the common operations of management. However, this creates a level of abstraction, which can act as a barrier between the administrator and the elements being controlled. This can contribute to a loss of trust in the management solution, and may lead to a loss of control of the managed environment. This thesis proposes a novel approach to system management called Iterative Automation that allows the administrator to define how a management task is performed, and enable the task to become automated in steps by providing more detail about what causes the task to be performed and what parameters it should use. The solution also allows administrators to define relevant task output that can be analysed for fault states and enable error recovery without administrator intervention. To compare this novel approach against existing management solutions, a novel evaluation methodology was created based on a set of non-functional requirements derived from the relevant I,iterature. This evaluation showed that while the Iterative Automation approach carries an initial overhead in human effort to enable management tasks to become automated, the level of effort decreases sharply. Meanwhile, the level of trustability and controllability that it offers is significantly higher than that of other automated approaches
|
|---|
