Method and apparatus for monitoring the status of non-pollable device in a computer network
First Claim
1. A method for determining a contact status in a computer network using a network management system, the computer network including a plurality of interconnected network entities including communicating network entities and at least one non-communicating network entity, the network management system executing the steps of:
- maintaining a virtual network of models of the network entities and model relations representing relations between the network entities, each model including a number of attributes and one or more inference handlers, the attributes being data which define the characteristics of the network entity being modeled, and the inference handler preforming a process on the data upon the occurrence of predetermined events in the model which trigger the inference handler, the attributes including a contact status for the corresponding network entity;
communicating with the communicating network entities to obtain operational information as to the status of the communicating network entities and updating the corresponding contact status attributes in the corresponding models; and
the inference handlers using the operational information as to the communicating network entities and the model relations between the non-communicating network entities and the communicating network entities to infer the contact status of the non-communicating network entity and updating its contact status, said non-communicating network entity being incapable of communicating with the network management system.
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Abstract
A network management system includes a user interface, a virtual network and a device communication manager. The virtual network includes models which represent network entities and model relations which represent relations between network entities. Each model includes network data relating to a corresponding network entity and one or more inference handlers for processing the network data to provide user information. The system can poll or communicate with certain network entities and can infer the status of network connectors and other network entities for which polling is impossible or impractical. The system performs a fault isolation technique wherein the fault status of a network device is suppressed when it is determined that the device is not defective. User displays include hierarchical location views and topological views of the network configuration. Network devices are represented on the displays by multifunction icons which permit the user to select additional displays showing detailed information regarding different aspects of the corresponding network device.
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Citations
29 Claims
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1. A method for determining a contact status in a computer network using a network management system, the computer network including a plurality of interconnected network entities including communicating network entities and at least one non-communicating network entity, the network management system executing the steps of:
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maintaining a virtual network of models of the network entities and model relations representing relations between the network entities, each model including a number of attributes and one or more inference handlers, the attributes being data which define the characteristics of the network entity being modeled, and the inference handler preforming a process on the data upon the occurrence of predetermined events in the model which trigger the inference handler, the attributes including a contact status for the corresponding network entity; communicating with the communicating network entities to obtain operational information as to the status of the communicating network entities and updating the corresponding contact status attributes in the corresponding models; and the inference handlers using the operational information as to the communicating network entities and the model relations between the non-communicating network entities and the communicating network entities to infer the contact status of the non-communicating network entity and updating its contact status, said non-communicating network entity being incapable of communicating with the network management system. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29)
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Specification