Handling consolidated tickets

Abstract

Handling problem tickets in a computing environment, in one aspect, may comprise identifying a plurality of tickets generated in the computing environment that are candidates for consolidation. The identifying may be done based on whether the tickets have the same or similar root cause, whether they are generated from virtual machines having same configuration, and/or one or more other criteria. The tickets which are candidates for consolidation may be grouped into a bundled group, and marked as bundled. Resolving a ticket from the bundled group may potentially resolves all tickets from the bundled group.

1 . A method of handling problem tickets in a computing environment, comprising:
 identifying a plurality of tickets generated in the computing environment that are candidates for consolidation into a bundled group;   marking the plurality of tickets as bundled;   selecting, by a processor, a representative ticket from the bundled plurality of tickets;   increasing, by the processor, a priority associated with the selected representative ticket;   decreasing, by the processor, one or more priorities respectively associated with one or more other tickets in the bundled group;   adding, by the processor, information associated with the consolidation to the plurality of tickets in the bundled group; and   entering the plurality of tickets into a ticketing system with the added information.   
     
     
         2 . Method of  claim 1 , further including:
 accessing an open ticket from the ticketing system;   resolving a problem associated with the open ticket;   determining whether the open ticket is marked as bundled;   in response to determining that the open ticket is marked as bundled:
 accessing a bundled ticket from a group associated with the open ticket; 
 evaluating a solution for the bundled ticket; 
 in response to solving a problem associated with the bundled ticket, closing the bundled ticket, and in response to determining that the problem associated with the bundled ticket is not solved, restoring original priority associated with the bundled ticket and returning the bundled ticket to the ticketing system. 
   
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 2 , wherein the accessing of the bundled ticket, the evaluating of the bundled ticket, closing of the bundled ticket if the associated problem is solved, and the restoring of the original priority if the associated problem is not solved, are performed for all bundled tickets in the group. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the identifying comprises identifying tickets that have the same root cause. 
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the identifying comprises identifying tickets generated from one or more virtual machines running on a same physical machine. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the identifying comprises identifying tickets generated from one or more virtual machines having a same configuration. 
     
     
         7 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the identifying comprises identifying tickets generated from one or more virtual machines which run different tiers of a multi-tier application. 
     
     
         8 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the identifying comprises identifying duplicate tickets. 
     
     
         9 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the identifying comprises identifying tickets that occur during a same time frame. 
     
     
         10 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the selecting a representative ticket comprises randomly selecting the representative ticket. 
     
     
         11 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the selecting a representative ticket comprises selecting one that has an earliest creation date among those in the plurality of bundled tickets. 
     
     
         12 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the selecting a representative ticket comprises selecting one that has most correlation to those in the plurality of bundled tickets. 
     
     
         13 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the decreasing one or more priorities respectively associated with one or more other tickets in the bundled group comprises reducing the priority of said other ticket in the bundled group if a total number of tickets in the computing environment having a defined low priority is below a threshold number. 
     
     
         14 . A method of handling problem tickets in a computing environment, comprising:
 identifying a plurality of tickets generated in the computing environment that are candidates for consolidation into a bundled group;   marking the plurality of tickets as bundled;   selecting, by a processor, a representative ticket from the bundled plurality of tickets;   increasing, by the processor, a priority associated with the selected representative ticket; adding, by the processor, information associated with the consolidation to the representative ticket;   reducing, by the processor, the priority of one or more of other tickets in the bundled group if a total number of tickets in the computing environment having a defined low priority is below a threshold number;   adding, by the processor, information associated with the representative ticket to the one or more other tickets in the bundled group; and   entering the plurality of tickets into a ticketing system with the added information.   
     
     
         15 . The method of  claim 14 , further including:
 accessing an open ticket from the ticketing system;   resolving a problem associated with the open ticket;   determining whether the open ticket is marked as bundled;   in response to determining that the open ticket is marked as bundled:
 accessing a bundled ticket from a group associated with the open ticket; 
 evaluating a solution for the bundled ticket based on the resolution of the problem associated with the open ticket; 
 in response to solving a problem associated with the bundled ticket, closing the bundled ticket, and in response to determining that the problem associated with the bundled ticket is not solved, restoring original priority associated with the bundled ticket and returning the bundled ticket to the ticketing system. 
   
     
     
         16 . The method of  claim 15 , wherein the accessing of the bundled ticket, the evaluating of the bundled ticket, closing of the bundled ticket if the associated problem is solved, and the restoring of the original priority if the associated problem is not solved, are performed for all bundled tickets in the group. 
     
     
         17 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein the identifying comprises identifying tickets that have the same root cause. 
     
     
         18 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein the identifying comprises identifying tickets generated from one or more virtual machines running on a same physical machine. 
     
     
         19 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein the identifying comprises identifying tickets generated from one or more virtual machines having a same configuration. 
     
     
         20 . The method of  claim 14 , wherein the identifying comprises identifying tickets generated from one or more virtual machines which run different tiers of a multi-tier application. 
     
     
         21 . A method of handling problem tickets in a computing environment, comprising:
 accessing an open ticket from a ticketing system handling the problem tickets;   resolving a problem associated with the open ticket;   determining, by a processor, whether the open ticket is marked as bundled;   in response to determining that the open ticket is marked as bundled:
 accessing, by the processor, a bundled ticket from a group associated with the open ticket; 
 evaluating, by the processor, a solution for the bundled ticket based on the resolution of the problem associated with the open ticket; 
 in response to solving a problem associated with the bundled ticket, closing the bundled ticket, and in response to determining that the problem associated with the bundled ticket is not solved, restoring original priority associated with the bundled ticket and returning the bundled ticket to the ticketing system. 
   
     
     
         22 . The method of  claim 21 , wherein the accessing of the bundled ticket, the evaluating of the bundled ticket, closing of the bundled ticket if the associated problem is solved, and the restoring of the original priority if the associated problem is not solved, are performed for all bundled tickets in the group.