Detecting and mapping a failure of a network element

• US 10,708,119 B1
• Filed: 05/17/2019
• Issued: 07/07/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 03/15/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: CSC Holdings LLC (Altice USA, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: CSC Holdings LLC (Altice USA, Inc.)
• Inventors: Cruickshank, III, Robert, Cioffi, Chris, Brady, Thomas, Hosseinzadeh, Maziar, Qian, Jiyuan, Sheikholeslami, Gholamhosein
• Primary Examiner(s): Ghowrwal, Omar J
• Application Number:
  US16/415,872
• Time in Patent Office: 417 Days
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0631 using root cause analysis; using analysis of correlation between notifications, alarms or events based on decision criteria, e.g. hierarchy, tree or time analysis
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0661 by reconfiguring faulty entities
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/507 Filtering out customers affected by service problems
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0847 Transmission error
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/16 Threshold monitoring

Abstract

Embodiments determine failures of a network element (NE) in an outside plant utilizing a connectivity trail that indicates NEs starting at the headend and ending at a distribution tap that serves one or more customer premise devices associated to a customer account. Embodiments determine a failed NE that serves the highest number of customers for which a trouble is reported to a ticketing system. Embodiments avoid reporting downstream child NEs that may be performing poorly due to the upstream failed parent NE. Embodiments associate the one or more customer premise devices, and a customer account with respective NEs of the connectivity trail, perform operational metric tests to determine whether a customer premise device associated with a customer account has failed, determine when an NE of the connectivity trail has failed. Embodiments also include rebooting the failed NE and/or notifying a ticketing system accordingly.

Claims

1. A system, comprising:

a memory; and

one or more processors communicatively coupled to the memory and configured to;

detect an intermittent issue along a connectivity trail of network elements (NE), wherein to detect, the one or more processors are configured to;

receive a plurality of operational metric types from a customer premise device associated with a customer account, wherein an operational metric type of the plurality of operational metric types comprises an average hourly upstream uncorrectable codeword error rate (US CER) based on physical level measurements of an upstream transmission from the customer premise device;

compare the plurality of operational metric types against corresponding operational metric threshold values to determine whether the customer account has failed;

based on the comparison, determine that the customer account has failed;

correlate the failed customer account with a status of the NEs on the connectivity trail on a geographical map; and

calculate using the failed customer account, a percentage of failed customer accounts for each of the NEs on the connectivity trail; and

based on the correlation and the calculation, determine a failed NE of the NEs on the connectivity trail, wherein the failed NE is a most upstream NE on the connectivity trail, wherein the failed NE performs a self-diagnosis to determine a source of failure, and wherein the failed NE performs a self-repair operation.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:

determine a range of values for a standard deviation operational metric for an operational metric type of the plurality of operational metric types, wherein the standard deviation operational metric is used to detect the intermittent issue.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the standard deviation operational metric comprises a measure of variability in data from a last period of samples.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to present on a graphical user interface (GUI) at least one of:

the connectivity trail, the status of the NEs on the connectivity trail and the failed customer account.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to present the connectivity trail in at least one of:

a tabular form or a tree map.

6. The system of claim 4, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to present on the GUI, a customer account being online, a customer account being partially failed, a customer account recently determined to be partially failing, or a customer account recently determined to have failed.

7. A method, comprising:

detecting an intermittent issue along a connectivity trail of network elements (NE), comprising;

receiving a plurality of operational metric types from a customer premise device associated with a customer account, wherein an operational metric type of the plurality of operational metric types comprises an average hourly upstream uncorrectable codeword error rate (US CER) based on physical level measurements of an upstream transmission from the customer premise device;

comparing the plurality of operational metric types against corresponding operational metric threshold values to determine whether the customer account has failed;

based on the comparing, determining that the customer account has failed;

correlating the failed customer account with a status of the NEs on the connectivity trail on a geographical map; and

calculating using the failed customer account, a percentage of failed customer accounts for each of the NEs on the connectivity trail; and

based on the correlating and the calculating, determining a failed NE of the NEs on the connectivity trail, wherein the failed NE is a most upstream NE on the connectivity trail, wherein the failed NE performs a self-diagnosis to determine a source of failure, and wherein the failed NE performs a self-repair operation.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising, determining a range of values for a standard deviation operational metric for an operational metric type of the plurality of operational metric types, wherein the standard deviation operational metric is used to detect the intermittent issue.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the standard deviation operational metric comprises a measure of variability in data from a last period of samples.

10. The method of claim 7, further comprising, presenting on a graphical user interface (GUI) at least one of:

the connectivity trail, the status of the NEs on the connectivity trail and the failed customer account.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising, presenting the connectivity trail in at least one of:

a tabular form or a tree map.

12. The method of claim 10, further comprising, presenting on the GUI, a customer account being online, a customer account being partially failed, a customer account recently determined to be partially failing, or a customer account recently determined to have failed.

13. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having instructions stored thereon, which when executed by a processor in an electronic device cause the processor to perform operations comprising:

detecting an intermittent issue along a connectivity trail of network elements (NE), comprising;

receiving a plurality of operational metric types from a customer premise device associated with a customer account, wherein an operational metric type of the plurality of operational metric types comprises an average hourly upstream uncorrectable codeword error rate (US CER) based on physical level measurements of an upstream transmission from the customer premise device;

comparing the plurality of operational metric types against corresponding operational metric threshold values to determine whether the customer account has failed;

based on the comparing, determining that the customer account has failed;

correlating the failed customer account with a status of the NEs on the connectivity trail on a geographical map; and

calculating using the failed customer account, a percentage of failed customer accounts for each of the NEs on the connectivity trail; and

based on the correlating and the calculating, determining a failed NE of the NEs on the connectivity trail, wherein the failed NE is a most upstream NE on the connectivity trail, wherein the failed NE performs a self-diagnosis to determine a source of failure, and wherein the failed NE performs a self-repair operation.

14. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 13, wherein the operations further comprise, determining a range of values for a standard deviation operational metric for an operational metric type of the plurality of operational metric types, wherein the standard deviation operational metric is used to detect the intermittent issue.

15. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 14, wherein the standard deviation operational metric comprises a measure of variability in data from a last period of samples.

16. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 13, wherein the operations further comprise, presenting on a graphical user interface (GUI) at least one of:

the connectivity trail, the status of the NEs on the connectivity trail and the failed customer account.

17. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 16, wherein the operations further comprise, presenting on the GUI, a customer account being online, a customer account being partially failed, a customer account recently determined to be partially failing, or a customer account recently determined to have failed.