Dynamically selecting service provider, computing system, computer, and program

A method of sending processing methods to a service provider from a service consumer using the service provider to provide a service to end users, the method comprising:

• acquiring resource information respectively from a plurality of service providers at predetermined intervals, where the resource information is information indicative of each service provided by each service provider and a quality or state of the service provider, which is the basis of selection of a service provider made by the service consumer, wherein the service provider provides cloud infrastructure to the service consumer in order to use the processing method to provide the service to the end users and wherein the resource information comprises information indicative of a financial health of each of the plurality of service providers and information on the operational status of each service provider including an indication of power efficiency of the service provider;
• creating or updating an evaluation table representing, in a common format, the resource information on the plurality of service providers based on the acquired latest resource information;
• acquiring the updated evaluation table each time the evaluation table is updated;
• referring to the evaluation table in response to acquiring the updated evaluation table to extract, for each processing method to be called by the service consumer, a service provider that satisfies a service level from the plurality of service providers, where the service level is requested by the service consumer for an associated item of the processing method as an item of the resource information predefined to be associated with the processing method and including an item of information indicative of a state of the service provider in which a quality of a service provided by the service provider could be affected;
• and
• converting the processing method into an instruction to the service provider extracted for the processing method when the service consumer calls the processing method using an API of the extracted service provider, and sending the instruction to the service provider,
• wherein when a failure occurs in one of the plurality of service providers, the evaluation table in which resource information indicating that the one service provider is unavailable is reflected is referred to extract, for each processing method to be called by the service consumer, a service provider that satisfies the service level from the plurality of service providers except the one service provider.

A computing system comprising:

• a service consumer using a service provider to provide a service to end users;
• and
• a service directory stored in a memory for providing an evaluation table representing, in a common format, resource information on a plurality of service providers as information indicative of each service provided by each service provider and a quality or state of the service provider, which is the basis of selection of a service provider made by the service consumer, wherein the service provider provides cloud infrastructure to the service consumer in order to use processing methods to provide the service to the end users and wherein the resource information comprises information indicative of a financial health of each of the plurality of service providers and information on the operational status of each service provider including an indication of power efficiency of the service provider,
• wherein the service consumer comprises:
• a table acquiring section for acquiring the evaluation table from the service directory;
• an extraction section for referring to the evaluation table acquired by the table acquiring section to perform processing for extracting, for each processing method to be called by a terminal thereof, a service provider that satisfies a service level requested by the terminal for the processing method from the plurality of service providers;
• and
• a conversion section for converting the processing method into an instruction to the service provider extracted for the processing method when the terminal calls the processing method using an API of the extracted service provider, and sending the instruction to the service provider.

A computer for using a service provider to provide a service to end users, the computer comprising a non-transitory computer memory, the computer further comprising:

• a table acquiring section for acquiring an evaluation table representing, in a common format, resource information on a plurality of service providers as information indicative of each service provided by each service provider and a quality or state of the service provider, which is the basis of selection of a service provider made by a terminal thereof, wherein the service provider provides cloud infrastructure to the service consumer in order to use processing methods to provide the service to the end users and wherein the resource information comprises information indicative of a financial health of each of the plurality of service providers and information on the operational status of each service provider including an indication of power efficiency of the service provider;
• an extraction section for referring to the evaluation table acquired by the table acquiring section to perform processing for extracting, for each processing method to be called by the terminal, a service provider that satisfies a service level requested by the terminal for the processing method from the plurality of service providers;
• and
• a conversion section for converting the processing method into an instruction to the service provider extracted for the processing method when the terminal calls the processing method using an API of the extracted service provider, and sending the instruction to the service provider.

A computer for providing an evaluation table for a plurality of service providers to a service consumer using a service provider to provide a service to end users, the computer comprising a non-transitory computer memory, the computer further comprising:

• a resource information acquiring section for acquiring resource information respectively from the plurality of service providers at predetermined intervals, wherein the resource information is information indicative of each service provided by each service provider and a quality or state of the service provider, which is the basis of selection of a service provider made by the service consumer, wherein the service provider provides cloud infrastructure to the service consumer in order to use processing methods to provide the service to the end users and wherein the resource information comprises information indicative of a financial health of each of the plurality of service providers and information on the operational status of each service provider including an indication of power efficiency of the service provider;
• a creation section for creating or updating the evaluation table representing, in a common format, the resource information on the plurality of service providers based on the latest resource information acquired by the resource information acquiring section;
• and
• a notification section for notifying the service consumer of the evaluation table created or updated by the creation section.

A program for causing a computer, which uses a service provider to provide a service to end users, to send processing methods to the service provider, the program stored in non-transitory computer memory, the program causing the computer to function as:

• a table acquiring section for acquiring an evaluation table representing, in a common format, resource information on a plurality of service providers as information indicative of each service provided by each service provider and a quality or state of the service provider, which is the basis of selection of a service provider made by the computer, wherein the service provider provides cloud infrastructure to the service consumer in order to use the processing method to provide the service to the end users and wherein the resource information comprises information indicative of a financial health of each of the plurality of service providers and information on the operational status of each service provider including an indication of power efficiency of the service provider;
• an extraction section for referring to the evaluation table acquired by the table acquiring section to extract, for each processing method to be called by the computer, a service provider that satisfies a service level requested by the computer for the processing method from the plurality of service providers;
• and
• a conversion section for converting the processing method into an instruction to the service provider extracted for the processing method when the computer calls the processing method using an API of the extracted service provider, and sending the instruction to the service provider.