Managing distributed applications using structural diagrams

A computer program product comprising one or more physical storage devices having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, when executed by one or more processors of a computer system, cause the computer system to implement a method for managing a distributed application using a structural diagram, the method comprising:

• an act of receiving a user input specifying the distributed application, which is to be managed across a plurality of computer systems, the distributed application comprising a plurality of tiers that execute across the plurality of computer systems, each tier representing a different type of functionality of the distributed application;
• an act of determining, based on the specified distributed application, which of a plurality of different nodes are to be displayed in the structural diagram, the plurality of nodes of the structural diagram representing application properties for managing the distributed application and including at least:
• (i) a first node representing an application management service of the distributed application, (ii) a second node representing at least one of the plurality of tiers of the distributed application, and (iii) a third node representing at least one computer system instance, the third node being a sub-node of the second node;
• an act of providing the structural diagram, which displays the determined nodes, each of the displayed nodes providing one or more graphical user interface controls for providing user input for managing the corresponding represented application property, thereby allowing non-linear configuration of the distributed software application across the plurality of computer systems and at an application management service level, at a tier level, and at an instance level;
• an act of receiving an input at one of the structural diagram's nodes indicating a task that is to be performed on at least one portion of the distributed application;
• and
• an act of performing the indicated task on the at least one portion of the distributed application.

A computer system comprising the following:

• one or more processors;
• system memory;
• one or more computer-readable storage media having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, causes the computing system to perform a method for providing a structural diagram to collect user input data for managing a distributed software application in a non-linear manner, the method comprising the following:
• receiving a user input specifying the distributed software application, which is to be managed across a plurality of computer systems, the distributed software application comprising a plurality of tiers that execute across the plurality of computer systems, each tier representing a different type of functionality of the distributed software application;
• determining, based on the specified distributed software application, which of a plurality of different nodes are to be displayed in the structural diagram, the plurality of nodes of the structural diagram representing application properties for managing the specified distributed software application and including at least:
• (i) a first node representing an application management service of the distributed software application, (ii) a second node representing at least one of the plurality of tiers of the distributed software application, and (iii) a third node representing at least one computer system instance, the third node being a sub-node of the second node;
• and
• providing the structural diagram, which displays the determined nodes, each of the displayed nodes providing one or more graphical user interface controls for providing user input for managing the corresponding represented application property, thereby allowing non-linear configuration of the distributed software application across the plurality of computer systems and at an application management service level, at a tier level, and at an instance level.