Failure cause estimation device and failure cause estimation method

• US 8,499,195 B2
• Filed: 03/25/2011
• Issued: 07/30/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 06/16/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Fujitsu Limited
• Original Assignee: Fujitsu Limited
• Inventors: Shimada, Kuniaki, Matsumoto, Yasuhide
• Primary Examiner(s): PATEL, KAMINI B
• Application Number:
  US13/064,462
• Publication Number:
  US 20110314332A1
• Time in Patent Office: 858 Days
• Field of Search: 714/26
• US Class Current: 714/26
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0709 in a distributed system consisting of a plurality of standalone computer nodes, e.g. clusters, client-server systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/079 Root cause analysis, i.e. error or fault diagnosis in a hardware test environment G06F11/22; in a software test environment G06F11/36

Abstract

A failure cause estimation device includes: a database that manages the causes of failure cases, questions, and replies thereto for each of the failure cases; a condition presentation unit that presents combinations of the questions and replies managed in the database on a display screen as branch conditions used to classify the cause of a failure case; a condition selection unit that selects at least one branch condition from the presented branch conditions according selection operation; a cause estimation unit that estimates a cause satisfying the at least one branch condition from the contents of the database; and a cause presentation unit that presents the estimated cause on the display screen as a cause candidate.

Claims

1. A failure cause estimation device comprising:

a first database that stores causes of past failure cases, questions, and replies thereto for each of the past failure cases;

a second database that stores combinations of the questions and the replies, the combinations being used to classify a cause of a failure case; and

a processor coupled to the first data base and the second data base,

wherein the processor executes a process comprising;

presenting the combinations of the questions and the replies thereto stored in the second database, as branch conditions;

accepting an input of a new branch condition including a combination of a question and a reply, the combination being not presented as the branch conditions;

storing the new branch condition in the second database;

estimating, with reference to the first database, at least one cause satisfying the new branch condition and at least one branch condition selected from the presented branch conditions; and

presenting the estimated at least one cause as at least one cause candidate.

2. The failure cause estimation device according to claim 1, wherein the process further comprises:

selecting a cause candidate from the at least one presented cause candidate, the selected cause candidate being used as the cause of the failure case;

storing, according to an addition registration operation, the selected cause and a combination of the question and the reply included in the at least one branch condition used to estimate the at least one cause, in the first database as a new failure case; and

storing the combination of the question and the reply in the second database, the combination being used to classify the new failure case.

3. The failure cause estimation device according to claim 1, wherein the process further comprises:

allowing a new question and a new reply to be inputted, and

selecting a combination of the new question and the new reply to the new question or a combination of one of the presented questions and the new reply to the one of the questions as a new branch condition according to an input operation.

4. The failure cause estimation device according to claim 1, wherein the process further comprises:

constructing a decision tree used when the cause of the failure case to be estimated is estimated from the causes, the questions, and the replies that are stored in the first database for each of the past failure cases, and wherein

the estimating includes using the decision tree to estimate a cause satisfying the at least selected one branch condition.

5. The failure cause estimation device according to claim 1, wherein the presenting of the combinations includes computing an evaluation value indicating a selection possibility for each of the questions each time a branch condition is selected and presenting the branch conditions for the questions in descending order of the evaluation value.

6. The failure cause estimation device according to claim 5, wherein, when the evaluation value of any one of the questions is equal to or less than a reference threshold value, the presenting of the combinations includes prohibiting the branch condition for the any one of the questions from being presented.

7. The failure cause estimation device according to claim 1, wherein,

after the at least one cause satisfying the at least selected one branch condition is estimated and when re-search operation is detected, the estimating sequentially includes estimating another at least one cause that satisfies the at least one branch condition except for one of the at least one branch condition while the one of the at least one branch condition is sequentially changed, and wherein

the presenting of the cause candidate includes presenting the another at least one cause sequentially estimated as another at least one cause candidate.

8. A failure cause estimation method of a failure cause estimation device, the failure cause estimation method comprising:

accessing a first database storing causes of past failure cases, questions, and replies thereto for each of the past failure cases, and a second database storing combinations of the questions and the replies, the combinations being used to classify a cause of a failure case;

presenting combinations of the questions and the replies thereto stored in the second database, as branch conditions;

accepting an input of new branch condition including a combination of a question and a reply, the combination being not presented as the branch conditions;

storing the new branch condition in the second database;

estimating, with reference to the first database, at least one cause satisfying the new branch condition and at least one branch condition selected from the presented branch conditions; and

presenting the estimated at least one cause as at least one cause candidate.

9. A computer-readable, non-transitory medium storing a failure cause estimation program causing a computer to execute a process comprising:

accessing a first database storing causes of past failure cases, questions, and replies thereto for each of the past failure cases, and a second database storing combinations of the questions and the replies, the combinations being used to classify a cause of a failure case;

presenting combinations of the questions and the replies thereto stored in the second database as branch conditions;

accepting an input of a new branch condition including a combination of a question and a reply, the combination being not presented as the branch conditions;

storing the new branch condition in the second database;

estimating, with reference to the first database, at least one cause satisfying the new branch condition and at least one branch condition selected from the presented branch conditions; and

presenting the estimated at least one cause as at least one cause candidate.

10. A failure cause estimation apparatus comprising:

a processor for accessing a first database storing causes of past failure cases, questions, and replies thereto for each of the past failure cases, and a second database storing combinations of the questions and the replies, the combinations being used to classify a cause of a failure case;

presenting combinations of the questions and the replies thereto stored in the second database, as branch conditions;

accepting an input of a new branch condition including a combination of a question and a reply, the combination being not presented as the branch conditions;

storing the new branch condition in the second database;

estimating, with reference to the first database, at least one cause satisfying the new branch condition and at least one branch condition selected from the presented branch conditions; and

presenting the estimated at least one cause as at least one cause candidate.