System and method for monitoring quality of service

• US 20080137550A1
• Filed: 12/11/2006
• Published: 06/12/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 12/11/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ecole polytechnique fãdãrale de lausanne epfl (Schweizerische Eidgenossenschaft)
• Original Assignee: Ecole polytechnique fãdãrale de lausanne epfl (Schweizerische Eidgenossenschaft)
• Inventors: Jurca, Radu, Faltings, Boi
• Granted Patent: US 8,843,385 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/252
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/06 Buying, selling or leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5003 Managing SLA; Interaction between SLA and QoS
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5009 Determining service level performance parameters or violations of service level contracts, e.g. violations of agreed response time or mean time between failures [MTBF]

Abstract

A computer implemented method is provided for monitoring the quality of service of a service provider, the method comprising the steps of receiving first and second reports from first and second clients, respectively, the first and second reports having information relating to the quality of service provided by the service provider to the first and second clients, respectfully, and estimating the quality of service of the service provider by aggregating the information in the first and second reports and comparing the aggregated information with conditions set forth in an agreement involving the service provider.

Claims

1. A computer implemented method for monitoring the quality of service of a service provider, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving first and second reports from first and second clients, respectively, the first and second reports having information relating to the quality of service provided by the service provider to the first and second clients, respectfully; and

computing an estimate of the quality of service of the service provider using the information in the first and second reports ; and

comparing the estimate with conditions set forth in an agreement involving the service provider.

2. The computer implemented method of claim 1 further comprising the step of rewarding the first client for providing the report.

3. The computer implemented method of claim 1 further comprising the step of penalizing the service provider if one or more conditions of the agreement have been violated.

4. The computer implemented method of claim 1 wherein the agreement has a condition that acknowledges that a given estimate using client reports is accepted for verifying the conditions on the quality of the service delivered.

5. The computer implemented method of claim 1 further comprising the step of limiting the number of reports provided by the first and second clients for each interaction with the service provider.

6. The computer implemented method of claim 1 further comprising the step of providing the first and second clients with monitoring and reporting codes.

7. The computer implemented method of claim 2 wherein the reward is a payment.

8. The computer implemented method of claim 2 wherein the reward is based upon one or more of the following:

the first report;

the second report; and

prior knowledge about the service provider and prior knowledge about the second client reporting.

9. The method of claim 1 further comprising the step of providing a signal if the estimated quality of service does not satisfy the conditions in the agreement.

10. A system for monitoring the quality of service of a service provider, the system comprising:

a mechanism including a component for receiving first and second reports from first and second clients, respectively, the first and second reports having information relating to the quality of service provided by the service provider to the first and second clients, respectively, and a component for computing an estimate of the quality of service of the service provider using the information in the first and second reports and comparing the estimate with conditions set forth in an agreement involving the service provider.

11. The system of claim 10 wherein the mechanism includes a component for rewarding the first client for the first report.

12. The system of claim 10 wherein the mechanism further comprises a component for penalizing the service provider if one or more conditions of the agreement have been violated.

13. The system of claim 10 wherein the mechanism further comprises a component that takes action if conditions of the agreement are violated.

14. The system of claim 11 wherein the reward is a payment.

15. The system of claim 11 wherein the reward is based upon one or more of the following:

value of the first report;

value of the second report; and

prior knowledge about the service provider and prior knowledge about the second client reporting.

16. The system of claim 11 wherein the reward is optimized in accordance with a set of constraints and objectives.

17. The system of claim 16 wherein the constraints include requiring the reward to be incentive compatible.

18. The system of claim 16 wherein the objectives comprise reward optimality with respect to expected budget.

19. The system of claim 16 wherein the objectives comprise reward optimality with respect to worst case budget.

20. The system of claim 16 wherein the objectives comprise reward optimality with respect to margins for lying.

21. The system of claim 16 wherein the objectives comprise reward optimality with respect to risk profile of clients.

22. The system of claim 16 wherein the objectives comprise reward optimality with respect to subjective constraints and preferences of the mechanism.

23. The system of claim 11 wherein the rewards can be computed using approximations of the optimization problems LP1 and LP2.

24. The system of claim 10 wherein the mechanism is a reputation mechanism.

25. The system of the claim 10 wherein the mechanism includes a component that can filter the client reports used to compute the estimate of the quality of service.

26. The system of the claim 25 wherein the filter component is automatically designed together with a reward scheme.

27. The system of claim 25 wherein the filter component defines probabilities to exclude reports.

28. The system of claim 27 wherein the probability to exclude a report depends upon one or more of the following:

value of the first report, value of the second report, prior knowledge about the provider and prior knowledge about the second client reporter.

29. The system of claim 25 wherein the filter component bounds the loss of information.

30. The system of claim 25 wherein the filter component ensures convergence of reputation information.

31. The system of claim 16 wherein the constraints comprise making honest reporting an equilibrium.

32. The system of claim 16 wherein the constraints comprise making honest reporting the only equilibrium.

33. The system of claim 16 wherein the constraints comprise making honest reporting the most attractive equilibrium.

34. The system of claim 16 wherein the second report is a trusted report.

35. The system of claim 16 wherein the mechanism uses trusted reports to eliminate undesired equilibria.

36. The system of claim 35 wherein mechanism determines the quantity of trusted reports to collect and the specific rewards to publish, such that the total cost is minimized.

37. The system of claim 16 wherein the rewards are designed to prevent small coalitions of clients from changing a reporting equilibrium.

38. The system of claim 16 wherein the rewards are designed to prevent any coalition of clients smaller than a certain fraction of the population from shifting the equilibrium.

39. The system of claim 38 wherein the mechanism uses an algorithm to detect a formation of a coalition of clients that provide inaccurate reports.

40. The system of claim 39 wherein the mechanism uses trusted reports to improve the resolution of the detection algorithm.

41. A computer implemented method for monitoring the quality of service of a provider, the method comprising the steps of:

establishing agreements wherein the service provider agrees to provide a specified quality of service to first and second clients;

receiving a first and second report from the first and second clients, respectively, each report including information relating to the quality of service of the service provider; and

computing an estimate of the quality of service as delivered using the first and second reports.

42. The computer implemented method of claim 41 further comprising the step of measuring compliance with conditions set forth in the agreement against the estimate.

43. The computer implemented method of claim 42 further comprising the step of determining whether to penalize the service provider based on the measurement.

44. The computer implemented method of claim 41 further comprising the step of rewarding the first client for reporting the quality of service observed.

45. The computer implemented method of claim 44 wherein the step of rewarding includes the step of scaling the rewards to encourage accurate reports.

46. The computer implemented method of claim 41 further comprising the step of assessing the accuracy of a first report by comparing the first report with the second report.

47. The computer implemented method of claim 46 further comprising the step of ensuring the accuracy of the assessment when a plurality of clients coordinate their actions to provide inaccurate reports.

48. The computer implemented method of claim 41 further comprising the step of signaling that the provider must be penalized for not delivering the agreed quality of service.

49. The computer implemented method of claim 41 wherein the step of estimating includes the step of computing the distribution of values for quality attributes set forth in the agreement.

50. The computer implemented method wherein the agreement is between a service provider and a client.

51. The computer implemented method wherein the agreement is between a service provider and an entity.

52. The computer implemented method wherein the entity is a regulator.

53. A system for monitoring the quality of service of a provider, the system comprising a mechanism including:

a component for receiving first and second reports from first and second clients, respectively, the first and second clients receiving services from the service provider in accordance with an agreement involving the service provider, each report including information relating to the quality of service of the service provider; and

a component for estimating the quality of service delivered using the first and second reports.

54. The system of claim 53 wherein the mechanism further includes a component for measuring compliance with conditions set forth in the agreement against this estimation.

55. The system of claim 54 wherein the mechanism further includes a component for determining whether to penalize the service provider based on the measurement.

56. A method for monitoring the quality of service of a service provider, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving a report from a client with information relating to the quality of service of the service provider; and

estimating the quality of service of the service provider using the report.

57. The method of claim 56 further comprising the step of rewarding the client for submitting the report.

58. The method of claim 56 further comprising the step of providing notice if the estimated quality of service does not satisfy a condition set forth in an agreement involving the service provider.