Service assurance automation access diagnostics

• US 7,818,283 B1
• Filed: 12/22/2005
• Issued: 10/19/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 12/22/2005
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: AT&T Corporation (AT&T, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Corporation (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Bienfait, Roberta A., Bajpay, Paritosh, Liu, Jackson, Dardashti, Mojgan, Qian, Zhiqiang, Eslambolchi, Hossein, McCanuel, John, Zinnikas, Michael J.
• Primary Examiner(s): Matar; Ahmad F
• Assistant Examiner(s): Le; Karen L
• Application Number:
  US11/316,145
• Time in Patent Office: 1,762 Days
• Field of Search: 707/10, 707/204, 707/E17.005, 704/42, 709/217
• US Class Current: N/A
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2898 Subscriber equipments DSL modems H04M11/062; cable modems H04L12/2801
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/4641 Virtual LANs, VLANs, e.g. virtual private networks [VPN] LAN interconnection over a bridge based backbone H04L12/462; encapsulation techniques H04L12/4633; routing of packets H04L45/00; packet switches H04L49/00; virtual private networks for security H04L63/0272
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/467 Arrangements for supporting untagged frames, e.g. port-based VLANs
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0659 by isolating or reconfiguring faulty entities
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0817 by checking functioning
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/50 Testing arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/40 for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity, e.g. service redundancy protocols, protocol state redundancy or protocol service redirection management of faults, events, alarms or notifications in data switching networks H04L41/06

Abstract

A business process automation system architecture is used to isolate problems in a virtual private network access network. Codified rules and a rules based program are used to determine all equipment from a customer premises equipment to a VPN core access point equipment on a VPN access path and that is associated with a failure. The codified rules also govern the gathering of information on the equipment including determining whether the equipment supports automated diagnostics and the communication protocols used. Extended PING testing is done on the equipment and a status of the extended PING test, link status, line protocol status, and existing loop status is determined. Further testing is automatically run based on the codified rules and the status. The failure is then isolated to the CPE, a local exchange carrier, or a network provider.

Claims

1. A method based on codified rules for automatically isolating failures in segments of a virtual private network (VPN) access path comprising:

receiving an indication of a failure in a rules based process automation (RBPA) program that is separate from the VPN access path;

determining, based on codified rules associated with the RBPA program, equipment associated with the failure including customer premises equipment (CPE), local exchange carrier equipment, and network provider equipment including VPN core access point equipment to a VPN core that are used on segments of the VPN access path;

gathering information related to the determined equipment used on the segments of the VPN access path, including support of automated diagnostic procedures and communication protocols used;

running a loop-back test on a selected segment of the VPN access path initiated by a request of the RBPA program to a centralized test platform which connects to the VPN access path;

determining status including results of the loop-back test, a link status, a line protocol status, and an existing loop status;

running additional selected tests based on the codified rules and the status; and

isolating the failure to the local exchange carrier equipment, the CPE, or the network provider equipment.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the loop-back test is an extended PING test.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the status is the extended PING test failed, the link status is down, the line protocol status is down, and the existing loop status is positive.

4. The method of claim 2 wherein the status is the extended PING test failed, the link status is up, the line protocol status is down, and the existing loop status is negative.

5. The method of claim 2 wherein the status is the extended PING test failed, the link status is down, the line protocol status is up, and the existing loop status is negative.

6. The method of claim 2 wherein the status is the extended PING test failed, the link status is up, the line protocol status is down, and the existing loop status is positive.

7. The method of claim 2 wherein the status is the extended PING test failed, the link status is down, the line protocol status is up, and the existing loop status is positive.

8. The method of claim 1 wherein the information on the determined equipment is obtained from a customer and network inventory databases, the information including devices that support loop-back testing.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein the additional tests include loop-back testing of other selected segments of the VPN access path.

10. A computer system for automatically isolating failures in segments of a virtual private network (VPN) access path using an automatic diagnostic program comprising:

means for receiving an indication of a failure in a rules based process automation (RBPA) program that is separate from the VPN access path;

a memory containing codified rules and the RBPA program for running automatic diagnostic procedures associated with the failure;

means for determining, based on the codified rules, equipment associated with the failure including customer premises equipment (CPE), local exchange carrier equipment, and network provider equipment including VPN core access point equipment to a VPN core that are used on segments of the VPN access path;

means for gathering information related to the determined equipment used on the segments of the VPN access path, including support of automated diagnostic procedures and communication protocols used;

means for running an extended PING test on a selected segment of the VPN access path initiated by a request of the RBPA program to a centralized test platform which connects to the VPN access path;

means for determining status including results of the extended PING test, link status, line protocol status, and existing loop status;

means for automatically running by the rules based program additional selected tests based on the codified rules and the status; and

means for isolating the failure to the local exchange carrier equipment, the CPE, or the network provider equipment.

11. The computer system of claim 10 wherein the VPN core access point equipment is an optical carrier xx (OCxx) card in a gigabit switch router.

12. The computer system of claim 11 wherein the status is further determined by reading and comparing snapshots of input and output packet counters in a port of the OCxx card.

13. The computer system of claim 10 wherein the additional tests include testing of the communication protocols used, including support for digital signal 0 (DS0), intermediate bit rate (IBR), digital signal 1 (DS1), and layer 1 synchronous optical network (SONET) tests.

14. The computer system of claim 10 further comprises:

means for automatically sending a voice message to a person responsible for the customer premises equipment (CPE) when the failure is isolated to the CPE.

15. A non-transitory computer-readable medium whose contents cause a computer system to perform an automated rules-based analysis of reported failures in segments of a virtual private network (VPN) access path comprising:

determining a reported failure meets the requirements for automatic diagnostic procedures according to a rules based process automation (RBPA) program that is separate from the VPN access path;

determining, based on codified rules associated with the RBPA program equipment associated with the failure including customer premises equipment (CPE), local exchange carrier equipment, and network provider equipment including VPN core access point equipment to a VPN core that are used on segments of the VPN access path;

gathering information related to the determined equipment used on the segments of the VPN access path, including support of automated diagnostic procedures and communication protocols used;

running an extended PING test on a selected segment of the VPN access path initiated by a request of the RBPA program to a centralized test platform which connects to the VPN access path

determining status including results of the extended PING test, link status, line protocol status, and existing loop status;

running additional selected tests based on codified rules and the status; and

isolating the failure to the local exchange carrier equipment, the CPE, or the network provider equipment.

16. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15 further comprises:

applying the codified rules by rule agents to determine the additional selected tests based on an analysis of the results of the extended PING test, link status, line protocol status, and existing loop status.

17. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 16 wherein the gathering of information is directed by the rule agents.

18. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 15 wherein the information on the determined equipment is obtained from a customer and network inventory databases, the information including equipment that support loop-back testing.

19. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 18 wherein the additional tests are automatically selected by rule agents operating in the RBPA program and include loop-back tests of equipment that supports loop-back testing.

20. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 19 further comprises:

running the loop-back tests in a selected sequence to isolate the failure to a specific segment of the VPN access path.