The invention relates to the integration of a unit in an apparatus, for example, for configuring a field replaceable unit (FRU) into apparatus such as a computer system.
FRUs can be used in many different systems. They find particular but not exclusive application to computer systems, for example to fault tolerant computer systems where it is desirable to be able readily to replace units which have developed a fault or have been superseded by a more recent version.
Examples of FRUs for such a system can include, for example, a CPU, a PCI card, power supply units (PSUs), a motherboard, or any other system components. One FRU, for example a field replaceable card, can include hardware for implementing several devices (e.g. a multiple Ethernet adapter, or a SCSI adapter with an Ethernet adapter).
It is known to provide FRUs with non-volatile memory (e.g. EEPROMs), which can contain information relating to the FRU. In a known system, FRUs can include basic FRU identification information in the non-volatile memory.
It is also known to provide a system management suite, collectively known as a configuration management system (CMS) which manages the FRUs, other devices and system resources using objects to represent the FRUs, devices and other system resources. An object forms a particular instance of a CMS class, which is defined by a CMS definition (CMSDEF).
For example, a CAF (Console and Fans unit) CMSDEF defines the CAF CMS class of which the object CAF_1 is an instance that represents a particular CAF FRU. The CAF_1 object may have an attribute called LOCATION having the value A_CAF, indicating that the FRU represented by the CAF_1 object has been inserted into location A_CAF in the chassis of the computer system.
A problem when initiating a system is to establish an initial configuration for the system, by supplying initial values to object attributes which represent that configuration.
In the known system mentioned above, the CMS used a chassis type number read from the EEPROM of control-panel FRU to establish a default configuration for the system. However, this provided only a crude configuration for the system, as it relied in effect on ‘fine-tuning’ a pre-defined configuration to the specific needs of that type of system. Only ‘standard’ parts of the configuration (e.g. the boot disks and their controllers and the CPUs) could be established in this way so much of the more complex configuration (e.g. serial ports) had to be performed manually.
An object of the invention is to provide an improved method of providing automatic configuration of FRUs, and also a system implementing such a method, and FRUs for use in such a system.