Abstract: Dynamic collection of system support files in a data processing environment, the data processing environment comprising a plurality of computing systems having different characteristics, including: querying, by a support manager plugin of a management module, a registry of extensions for a support file type provider extension; presenting, by the support manager plugin to a user, a list of types of system support files available from the particular computing system; receiving, by the support manager plugin, a user selection of a type of system support file to retrieve from the particular computing system; querying, by the support manager plugin, the registry of extensions for a data collector extension; and retrieving, by the support manager plugin, the system support file from the particular computing system, including executing the data collection operation specified in the identified data collector extension.

Abstract: A method of establishing a bi-directional grid computing network includes submitting a processing job from a job requester to a central repository, querying nodes associated with the job requester to process the processing job, identifying suitable nodes associated with the job requester to process the processing job, transmitting the processing job from the job requester to at least one of the suitable nodes associated with the job requester, processing the processing job on the at least one suitable node associated with the job requester, and returning results from processing the processing job to the job requester.