Re: Question for Provider Developers - It is possible to completely automate the process of writing a CMPI provider?

In general, the answer is no. The complete 
provider generation cannot be automated at this 
point because in addition to the glue component 
(provider infrastructure, object generation, 
etc.) there is real special intellectual property 
in the relationship between the CIM Instances and 
the source of data and also real provider writer 
intellectual property in the optimization of the 
provider (ex. design one to handle 100,000 
instances in a reasonable time frame).

As Steve noted, we have tools to help with 
infrastructure creation, cimom interface, 
relationship between the programming language and 
the model, and even management of caching, etc. 
but that still leaves much territory for the 
provider writer (ex. SimpleWbem and KonkretCMPI). 
These and other similar tools automate the 
generation of the infrastructure, provide support 
for some standard patterns of provider generation 
and improve the relationship between the CIM 
Model and the code (ex. create c++ classes for 
the CIM Class being processed).  They do not tell 
the provider writer where to get the data for the instances.

As the profile generation mechanisms are further 
defined in machine readable format (the MRP work) 
more and more of the provider writing exercise 
will be automatable but since the source of 
information is still specific to the provider, 
that part will still be coded.  In other words we 
move bit-by-bit to a more functional model of code for providers.

There are particular cases where we will be able 
to completely automate the provider. For example:

1. An association provider that associates one 
instance of class A with every instance of class 
B.  That is simple but it already defined the 
logic that every instance of Class B is to be 
associated with each instance of Class A.  It is 
a boundary case for a provider but one that could 
be defined in a pattern to be completely defined 
as part of provider generation.

2. A provider where the complete data could be 
defined in terms of mof (i.e. the 
instances).  This could be built completely from 
the class and instance mof.  But this is really a 
static provider and not much different than 
putting the instances in the cim server repository.

Good question in any case and we will get better 
at automating this process but it will be up to 
the provider writer to glue it all together for a 
long time.  We tool writers are trying to make 
the provider writers job easier and to let him 
concentrate on the part that really brings value 
(i.e. the system engineering part of provider 
writing (optimizing providers, 
getting/caching/storing data, etc.) rather than the low level infrastructure.

Karl


Thanks for your message at 11:36 PM 11/21/2010, 
Chatterjee, Biswapratap. Your message was:
>Hi all,
>
>This question has been banging in my head for 
>quite some time. “It is possible to completely 
>automate the process of writing a CMPI provider?”
>
>I have been putting lot of effort in making this 
>possible. Since, I have always believed that 
>writing a provider is a repetitive task. If it is a standard,
>then we have a set of guidelines to write it, we 
>just have to develop an intelligent software who 
>can understand the guidelines on its own and
>automate the process of provider development. 
>The developer should only worry about the schema diagram that abstracts its
>hardware/architecture. Something like – “Draw 
>your schema and get your provider shared object”.
>
>If you feel this is an interesting topic than we 
>can take this discussion to the next level about 
>– “Possible ways to accomplish this objective”.
>
>Waiting for your replies and ideas ….
>
>Regards,
>Biswapratap.
>

Karl Schopmeyer                   Inova Development Inc.
305 Spring Creek Village, Suite 475 -  Dallas TX, 75248 USA
EMAIL: [email protected]       FAX: 1-972-239-0326
Phone 1-972-814-5581
Skype: kschopmeyer         Skype Phone: (214) 556-5971