JPH01273141A - Peripheral device automatic identification method - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve the work efficiency for the maintenance/test by providing a discriminating information table group having discriminating information of all kinds of peripheral equipments which can be connected to the system and selecting the discriminating information being the most suitable for response information from the peripheral equipment, from the discriminating information table group. CONSTITUTION:The title system is provided with a discriminating information table group 4 having discriminating information 412 of all kinds of peripheral equipments having possibility to be connected to a computer system for utilizing a program for the maintenance/test. In this state, a sequence by a discrimination processing 3 for selecting the discriminating information 412 which coincides with response information obtained by starting the peripheral equipment, from in a discriminating information table group 4, and a processing for generating a peripheral equipment control table corresponding to an input/output address of the peripheral equipment which has been started, based on the contents of a discriminating information table 41 which has been obtained by this discrimination processing 3 is executed to all the input/output addresses, and the peripheral equipment control table is generated automatically. In such a way, an operator's burden can be reduced.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to a maintenance/testing method for a general-purpose computer system, and more particularly to a peripheral device automatic identification method for maintenance/testing.

[Conventional technology]

-i, a wide variety of peripheral devices are connected to a general-purpose computer system, and the monitor program generates a peripheral device control table in memory that has a one-to-one correspondence with each peripheral device, and uses this table to Controls peripheral devices. In order to generate this peripheral device control table, computer system configuration information such as which peripheral devices are connected to which input/output addresses is required.
For example, in the case of an operating system, the system engineer creates this configuration information when building the system, so the monitor program can generate a peripheral device control table and control the entire system according to this configuration information. .

On the other hand, maintenance/test programs must be able to operate in common on various systems, and
Even in the case of a specific system, it is difficult to have system configuration information in advance because it is necessary to take into account changes in the configuration/state of peripheral devices. Therefore, in conventional maintenance/test work, the operator inputs the necessary peripheral device information each time the operator performs the work, and the monitor program creates a peripheral device control table only for the peripheral devices registered by the operator. Generally, it is generated to control the system.

Incidentally, as a conventional technique related to this kind of maintenance/testing, for example, a technique described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 129864/1984 is known.

[Problem to be solved by the invention]

In recent years, computer systems have become larger, and the information indicating the types of peripheral devices and the number of connected peripheral devices have increased.

Therefore, in the maintenance/testing work using the conventional technology,
As the burden on operators engaged in work increases,
There was a problem that the time required for the work increased.

In addition, the conventional technology described in the above publication can reduce the burden of system generation by providing the computer system itself with a mechanism to automatically generate system configuration information, but it cannot operate on an unspecified system. The problem with maintenance/test monitor programs that must be implemented is that the above-mentioned mechanism cannot be expected for all systems.

An object of the present invention is to enable a program to automatically generate a peripheral device control table by itself without requiring configuration information created in advance, input information from an operator, or a special mechanism of the system. An object of the present invention is to provide a peripheral device automatic identification method that makes it possible to improve work efficiency for maintenance/testing.

[Means to solve the problem]

According to the present invention, the object is to provide a group of identification information tables having identification information of all types of peripheral devices that may be connected to a computer system that utilizes a program for maintenance/testing; Identification processing that selects identification information that matches the response information obtained by activating the device from the identification information table group; and a peripheral device activated based on the contents of the identification information table obtained by this identification processing. This is achieved by automatically generating a peripheral device control table by executing a sequence of processing for all input/output addresses to generate a peripheral device control table corresponding to the input/output address.

[Effect]

The designer of the monitor program for maintenance/testing checks in advance the types of peripheral devices that can be connected to the unspecified computer system that runs this monitor program, and also checks the response information obtained when the peripheral device is activated. Check the specifications of each peripheral device.

The identification information obtained in this way is tabulated and created into an identification information table that has a one-to-one correspondence with the type of peripheral device, and these are collected into an identification information table group,
It is set within the monitor program.

The automatic peripheral device control table generation process issues an I10 activation command to all input/output addresses on a trial basis, determines whether a peripheral device is connected to each input/output address, and then issues a peripheral device control table automatically. The sequence of securing a control table area in memory, passing this area and input/output addresses to identification processing, and generating a peripheral device control table is performed for all input/output addresses to which peripheral devices are connected. This is done by executing

In addition, in the identification process, I10 is activated in order to obtain the information necessary to identify the peripheral device for the input/output address received from the peripheral device control table automatic generation process, and the response information obtained thereby is activated. This is done by selecting an identification information table suitable for the above-mentioned identification information table group from the identification information table group, and then copying information necessary for controlling the peripheral device from the identification information table to the peripheral device control table.

The foregoing process allows the maintenance/test program to generate peripheral device control tables for the system without system-specific configuration information or operator input.

[Embodiment] Hereinafter, an embodiment of the automatic peripheral device identification method according to the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the program configuration according to an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a diagram showing the configuration of a group of identification information tables, FIG. 3 is a diagram showing the configuration of one identification information table, and FIG. 4 is a diagram showing the configuration of one identification information table. The figure is a flowchart explaining the operation of an embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating the operation of the identification process. 1 to 5, 1 is an input/output address selection processing section, 2 is an area reservation process, 3 is an identification process, 4 is a group of identification information tables, and 41 is an identification information table.

The program configuration shown in FIG. 1 shows an example of the overall configuration of a peripheral device control table automatic generation processing program that implements the peripheral device automatic identification method according to the present invention. 2, identification processing 3, and identification information table group 4.

In FIG. 1, the human output address selection processing section 1 is
For all the input/output addresses that the system has, it is determined whether a peripheral device is connected or not, and for the input/output address to which the peripheral device is connected, area reservation processing 2 and identification processing 3 are started, and the peripheral device It has a function to generate a control table. In addition, area reservation processing 2 is a process for securing a peripheral device control table area corresponding to an input/output address on the memory, and identification processing 3 is a process for securing a peripheral device control table area corresponding to an input/output address on the memory, and identification processing 3 is a process for securing a peripheral device control table area corresponding to an input/output address on the memory. This process generates a peripheral device control table using group 4.

As shown in FIG. 2, the identification information table 4 is created in advance by a maintenance/test monitor program designer.
It consists of a set of multiple identification information tables 41 that correspond one-to-one with the types of peripheral devices that can be connected to the system, and an end sign 42 that provides an end condition to the process of searching for a necessary identification information table. As shown in FIG. 3, each identification information table 41 includes a peripheral device model name 411 that indicates the model name of the peripheral device using 12-byte character data, identification information 412 that is response information that characterizes the peripheral device,
It is composed of control information 413 necessary to control peripheral devices. Then, the identification information 412 is determined by the identification processing 3.
It is referenced when one identification information table 41 is selected from the identification information table group 4, and the control information 413 is copied to the peripheral device control table by the identification process 3.

Hereinafter, the operation of one embodiment of the present invention will be explained in detail with reference to the flowcharts shown in FIGS. 4 and 5.

(1) The input/output address selection processing unit 1 first selects the first address among the input/output addresses possessed by the system (flow 11).

(2) The selected input/output address is activated on a trial basis, and it is determined whether a peripheral device is connected to this human output address (Flow 12).

(3) If the result of the determination in flow 12 is YES,
The input/output address selection processing unit 1 activates the area reservation processing 2 to secure an area for the peripheral device control table corresponding to the input/output address in the memory, and further secures the area for the input/output address and the peripheral device control table. As an input, identification processing 3 is activated to generate a peripheral device control table (processing in area reservation processing 2 and identification processing).

(4) After one peripheral device control table is generated by identification process 3, or if the determination in flow 12 is No.
In this case, it is determined whether the human output address is the final input/output address possessed by the system, and if this determination is YES, the peripheral device control table automatic generation process ends (Flow 1).
3).

(5) If the determination in flow 13 is No, the input/output address is updated and the processes from flow 12 are repeatedly executed (flow 14).

The foregoing operations generate peripheral device control tables necessary for maintenance/testing purposes. The detailed operation of the identification process 3 in the above-mentioned operation is shown in FIG. This will be explained below.

(i) Activate the input/output address input from the input/output address selection processing unit 1 and receive response information from the peripheral device (Flows 31 and 32).

(2) An identification information table 41 having identification information 411 suitable for this response information is selected from the identification information table group 4 (Flow 33).

(3) Peripheral device model name 4 of the selected identification information table 41
11 and control information 413 are copied in the determined case of the peripheral device control table area input from the input/output address selection processing section 1 (Flow 34).

Through such operations, the identification process 3 generates individual peripheral device control tables for peripheral devices connected to the system.

As is clear from the above description of the operation, according to the embodiment of the present invention, the monitor program for maintenance/testing can automatically generate the peripheral device control table described above, so that system-specific configuration information Alternatively, it is possible to generate control tables for all peripheral devices connected to the system without any input information from the operator.

In the embodiment of the present invention described above, the input/output addresses in the input/output address selection processing section 1 are updated in the order from the first input/output address to the final input/output address, but the addresses are updated in the reverse order. You may go. Furthermore, it is also possible to limit the peripheral devices that can be controlled by the monitor program by limiting the update range or update conditions of input/output addresses according to an operator's instructions or the like.

Furthermore, in the above-described embodiment of the present invention, the peripheral device is activated once in the identification process 3, but if the peripheral device cannot be identified by one activation and response of the peripheral device, the process shown in FIG. In the flowchart shown, the startup process (flow 31
) to the identification information table selection process (flow 33) may be repeatedly executed. At this time, the identification information 412 of the identification information table 41 may be divided into several levels. In addition, if there is no need to enter the model name of the peripheral device in the peripheral device control table, the identification information table 41
The peripheral device type name 411 inside may be deleted.

Furthermore, in the embodiment of the present invention described above, the number of times the input/output address selection processing section 1 calls the area reservation processing 2 and the identification processing 3 is the same as the number of connected peripheral devices. , the process of determination 1 (flow 12) shown in FIG. 4 is completed for all input/output addresses, and all input/output addresses to which peripheral devices are connected are subjected to area reservation process 2 and identification process at once. It is also possible to call these processes only once by passing them to 3. In this way, the processing time for generating the peripheral device control table can be shortened.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As explained above, according to the present invention, it is possible to create a peripheral device control table without requiring information input from an operator when executing a maintenance/test monitor program running on a general-purpose computer system. Therefore, the burden on the operator can be significantly reduced. Further, by using the peripheral device control table, the system configuration can be easily checked, so it is possible to easily detect a connection failure of a peripheral device or a mistake in creating system configuration information. Furthermore, if the present invention is applied to an operation system, it is effective for checking the normality of system generation.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an example of a program configuration according to an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of the configuration of an identification information table group,
FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a configuration example of one identification information table, FIG. 4 is a flowchart explaining an operation example of an embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 5 is a flowchart explaining an operation example of identification processing. . 1.--Person output address selection processing section, 2.--Area securing processing, 3.--Identification processing, 4.--.
Identification information table group, 41--Identification information table. Figure 1 Figure 2 Figure 3 Figure Peng 4 Figure 5 ND

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In the maintenance/testing method for general-purpose computer systems, a group of identification information tables containing identification information of all types of peripheral devices that can be connected to the system is provided, and information on peripheral devices obtained by activating the connected peripheral devices is provided. An automatic peripheral device identification method characterized in that identification information most suitable for response information of is selected from the identification information table group.