JPH08241255A - Network controller - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To simplify the operation and procedure required for the fault analysis of an operator when a fault is generated in a network. CONSTITUTION: When the fault alarm data from a network is received in a fault part 1, a fault cause analysis part 3 reads the first question data corresponding to the fault alarm data from a storage part 4 and displays the data on a display device 5. When an operator answers the question, the fault cause analysis part 3 repeats the operation of the redisplay of the next question data according to the answer and finally presents the data showing a restoring method. Based on the statistics of the flow of the past questions when the restoring method which is useful for the restoration of the fault is presented, omissible questions are automatically skipped at the time of the succeeding analysis.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a network management device, and more particularly to a network management device having a function of presenting an operator with a method for recovering from a failure when a failure occurs on the network.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art When a failure occurs on a network,
It is important to take necessary measures immediately. Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 62-214 has been disclosed in the prior art aiming at such a thing.
There is a network fault handling method found in Japanese Patent No. 457.

This network failure processing system relates to a failure that occurs in the system on a computer network in which a plurality of terminal devices are connected to a communication control device connected to a host computer via a communication line. When there is an opportunity to output a failure message to the console, the failure processing unit is started using the message code of the failure message as a parameter, and this failure processing unit teaches a method for handling the failure corresponding to the message code. The sentence is displayed on the display device, and a trouble repair request table with information necessary for searching the cause of the trouble is output.

[0004]

In this prior art, a sentence or the like that teaches a method for dealing with a failure is uniquely determined from the message code of the failure message, and the message code and the failure have a one-to-one correspondence. It is supposed to correspond. Therefore, it cannot be applied when it is necessary to inquire the operator about other situations in order to identify the cause without being able to uniquely identify the fault only by the information detected when the fault occurs. .

For example, in a communication network, a modulator / demodulator has a function of constantly measuring a signal-to-noise ratio (S / N ratio), a received signal level, a frequency offset, etc., which are deterioration factors of data received from an opposite modulator / demodulator. If the deterioration factor value is greater than the preset value, the alarm I
D, device address, alarm factor type (transmission level drop, etc.)
The fault alarm data including the message is transmitted to the network management device via the control line.
Since the cause of the failure cannot be uniquely specified only by the device address and the type of the alarm factor, the above conventional technique cannot be applied as it is.

Therefore, an object of the present invention is to sequentially present to the operator questions necessary for estimating the cause of failure, acquire necessary data, estimate the cause of failure, and finally provide a recovery method. It is to provide a network management device that can be presented to an operator.

[0007] Further, based on statistics of the flow of questions when presenting a recovery method that is useful for recovery from failures, in the subsequent analysis, by skipping optional questions automatically, failure analysis of the operator can be performed. It also aims to further simplify the required operations and procedures.

[0008]

In order to achieve the above object, the present invention is necessary for estimating a cause of failure, and a plurality of final instruction data indicating a recovery method for each estimated cause of failure. A plurality of question data describing a question, each question data includes a plurality of options for selecting an answer to the question, each option having a weighting factor, and A question / final instruction data storage unit that stores a question / final instruction data group that uniquely defines question data or final instruction data to be applied next for each option, and question data or final data from the question / final instruction data storage unit. The data reading means for reading the instruction data, and the question data to be applied first based on the fault alarm data received from the network is determined and the reading is performed. Leading question data determining means for instructing the data reading means, determining means for determining whether the data read by the data reading means is question data or final instruction data, and the question data determined by the determining means Skip determination means for determining whether or not to skip the question data based on the weighting factor of each option of
When the skip determination means determines to skip, the question data or the final instruction data corresponding to the option having the maximum weighting factor in the question data is determined and the skip destination data for instructing the data readout means to read the same. Determination means, display control means for displaying on the display device the question data determined not to be skipped by the skip determination means and the final instruction data determined by the determination means, and among the question data displayed on the display device. When any one of the options is selected, the next data determination means for determining the question data or the final instruction data corresponding to the selected option and instructing the data reading means to read the data is useful for the recovery of the failure. Based on the flow of questions when presenting the recovery method Question data corresponding and a weight coefficient change means for adding a weighting factor of choice.

[0009]

In the network management device of the present invention, fault alarm data such as "alarm ID, device address, alarm factor type" is sent from, for example, a modulation / demodulation device on the network having a control communication function with the network management device. Then, the leading question data determining means determines the question data to be applied first based on the fault alarm data and instructs the data reading means to read the question data, and the data reading means causes the question / final instruction data storage means. Read the corresponding question data from. The read question data is determined to be question data by the data type determination means, and is passed to the skip determination means.

The question data includes a question necessary for estimating the cause of failure and a plurality of options for selecting an answer to the question, and each option has a weighting factor. Has been granted. Here, the weighting factor corresponds to the frequency with which the option is selected in the question flow when the recovery method useful for recovery from the failure is presented. The skip determination means determines whether to skip the question data based on the weighting factor of each option in the question data. For example, if there are three choices, the weighting coefficient of one of the choices exceeds a predetermined value, and the sum of the weighting coefficients of the remaining choices is sufficiently smaller than a certain value, statistically Since the option with the largest weighting factor is more likely to be selected,
It turns out that you can use that option as the answer without even asking the operator a question. In such a case, the skip determination means determines that the question data should be skipped, and otherwise determines that the question data should not be skipped.

The question control data determined not to be skipped is displayed on the display device by the display control means and presented to the operator. On the other hand, for the question data determined to be skipped, the skip destination data determination means determines the question data or the final instruction data corresponding to the option having the maximum weighting coefficient in the question data and asks the question data through the data reading means. It is read from the final instruction data storage means.

When the operator selects any one of a plurality of options for the question in the question data displayed on the display device, the next data determining means causes the next data determining means to output the question data or the final data corresponding to the selected option. The instruction data is determined and read out from the question / final instruction data storage means through the data reading means.

When the data determined and read by the skip destination data determining means and the next data determining means is question data, the same processing as the first question data is performed. On the other hand, if it is the final instruction data, it is discriminated by the data type discriminating means and displayed on the display device by the display control means.

The final instruction data displayed on the display device shows the presumed cause of failure and the method of recovery. Therefore, the operator should take measures according to the restoration method. Then, when the failure is recovered by the recovery method, the weighting factor changing means determines the weighting factor of the corresponding option of the relevant question data in the question / final instruction data group based on the flow of the question when presenting the restoration method. Is added.

[0015]

Embodiments of the present invention will now be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

Referring to FIG. 1, a network management apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention includes a failure detection unit 1, an input / output control unit 2, a failure cause analysis unit 3, a question / final instruction data storage unit 4, The display device 5, the printer 6 and the input device 7 are connected to a component device of a network (not shown) to be managed via a control communication line 8.

A large number of question data and final instruction data are stored in advance in the question / final instruction data storage unit 4. Each question data contains the question necessary to estimate the cause of the disorder and multiple options for selecting the answer. For each option, the question data to be applied next or the final question data is included. The instruction data is uniquely determined. A weighting factor is assigned to each option. The initial value of this weighting factor is 0. On the other hand, the final instruction data describes the presumed cause of failure and its recovery method. A code number for identifying them is assigned to a large number of these question data and final instruction data, and in this embodiment, the question data and the question data and the final instruction data are associated with each other by the code number. Is going.

FIG. 2 shows a query 1 after passing through some question data.
An example of association between question data until reaching one final instruction data and between question data and final instruction data is shown, and the circles Q1 to Q7 indicate the question data and the symbol R.
□ with 1 to R10 indicates the final instruction data as ○, ○, and ○.
The line connecting □ and □ shows their relationship. In this example, a question is first asked using the question data Q1, and if the answer is the first option out of the two options, then a question is asked using the question data Q2, and this question data Q2
When the first option is selected in the question by, the question is asked by the question data Q4, and when the first option is selected by the question by the question data Q4, the final instruction data R1 is presented, If the second selection option is selected, the final instruction data R2 is presented, and if the third option is selected, the final instruction data R3 is presented. When the answer by each question data is different from the above, the question data is changed and the final instruction data is also changed according to the relationship of the tree structure shown in the figure.

In FIG. 2, the numbers attached to the shoulders of ◯ and □ are code numbers. As shown in the figure, the code number of the lower data in the tree structure is the code number of the immediately preceding higher data with the option number added to the end. That is, for example, the code number of the question data Q2 is the code number "00010008" of the question data Q1.
"000100081" to which the option number "1" corresponding to the first option is added. By assigning code numbers in this way, for example, when an operator selects an option for a certain question data, the code number of the data to be presented next can be immediately obtained.

Referring again to FIG. 1, the fault detecting section 1 is a part for detecting the occurrence of a fault. The fault detection unit 1 is connected to a network component via a communication line 8 and receives an "alarm I" transmitted from the network component.
When the failure alarm data including "D, device address, alarm factor type" is received, it is determined to be a failure notification by the alarm ID, and "time, device address, alarm factor type" in which time data is added to the device address, alarm factor type It has a function of generating it as alarm data and notifying it to the input / output control unit 2 and the failure cause analysis unit 3. In the case of a communication network, the network equipment that transmits the failure warning data is mainly
It has a function to constantly measure a signal-to-noise ratio, a received signal level, a frequency offset, etc., which are deterioration factors, from a modulation / demodulation signal of data received from the opposite modulation / demodulation device. If the deterioration factor value is larger than a preset value, There is a modulation / demodulation device that sends “device ID, device address, alarm factor type” as fault alarm data to the network management device via the communication line 8.

The input / output control unit 2 is interposed between the failure detection unit 1 and the failure cause analysis unit 3 and the display device 5, the printer 6 and the input device 7 such as a keyboard, and the display device 5 is provided.
Displaying question data and the like, controlling printing of the printer 6, inputting data from the input device 7, and the like.

The failure cause analysis section 3 is automatically activated at the time when the failure is detected by the failure detection section 1, and the alarm data notified from the failure detection section 1, the contents of the question / final instruction data storage section 4 and It controls the estimation of the cause of the failure according to the input from the operator and presents the recovery method to the operator. In the case of the present embodiment, the failure cause analysis unit 3 includes the leading question data determining unit 30, the conversion table 31, the data reading unit 32, the data type determining unit 33, the skip determining unit 34, the skip destination data determining unit 35, and the display control. Means 36, next data determination means 37,
The log collecting unit 38 and the weighting factor changing unit 39 are included. Each has the following functions and the like.

Conversion table 31: For each combination of the device address and the alarm factor type included in the alarm data, the question data to be presented first when the alarm data of such a combination is notified from the failure detection unit 1. Holds the code number. FIG. 3 shows an example of the contents of the conversion table 31.

First question data determination means 30: Question data to be presented first by searching the conversion table 31 using the combination of the device address and the alarm factor type in the alarm data notified from the failure detection unit 1 as a key. Code number is determined and the data reading means 32 is instructed to read the code number.

Data reading means 32; question / final instruction data storage section 4 for question data or final instruction data having a code number instructed from the first question data determining means 30, the next data determining means 37, and the skip destination data determining means 35. Is a means for reading from.

Data type judging means 33: means for judging whether the data read by the data reading means 32 is question data or final instruction data.

Skip determining means 34 is means for determining whether or not to skip the question data based on the weighting coefficient of each option in the read question data. Various criteria can be considered as this criterion, but in the present embodiment, when the maximum value of the weighting factors exceeds a predetermined value and all other values of the weighting factors are sufficiently small. In addition, it adopts the criteria to judge that it should be skipped.

Skip destination data determination means 35: When the skip determination means 34 determines to skip, it determines the code number of the question data or final instruction data corresponding to the option having the maximum weighting coefficient in the question data. , A means for instructing the data reading means 32 to read the data. The code number to be determined is the code number of the question data with the option number having the maximum weighting factor added to the end.

Display control means 36; skip determination means 3
It controls the process of displaying the question data determined not to be skipped in 4 and the final instruction data determined by the data type determination means 33 on the display device 5 through the input / output control unit 2. At this time, in the present embodiment, the display color of the option in the displayed question data is displayed in the display character color according to the value of the weighting coefficient. This is to inform the operator of the past selection status, and to assist the judgment. It should be noted that the larger the value of the weighting factor, the more the display color corresponds to the warning color, which facilitates intuitive grasping.

Next data determining means 37: When any of the options in the question data displayed on the display device 5 is selected by the operator by operating the input device 7, the question data corresponding to the selected option. Alternatively, it is a means for determining the code number of the final instruction data and instructing the data reading means 32 to read the code number. The code number to be determined is the code number of the question data to which the number of the selected option is added.

Log collecting means 38: means for collecting the alarm data notified from the failure detecting section 1, the question data and the final instruction data displayed on the display device 5 by the display control means 36, and accumulating them as a log. The accumulated log is printed out from the printer through the input / output control unit 2. Further, it is referred to by the weighting factor changing means 39.

Weighting factor changing means 39: When the processing is completed and the fault is restored, the log collected by the log collecting means 38 is referred to, and the corresponding question data in the question / final instruction data storage unit 4 is found. It is a means for adding the weighting factors of the options.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing a processing example of the failure cause analysis unit 3, FIG. 5 is a display example of a failure alarm log, FIGS. 6 and 7 are examples of question data, and FIG. 8 is a printed out failure processing request table. Examples of The operation of this embodiment will be described below with reference to the drawings.

In FIG. 1, when the fault alarm data is received from the communication line 8, the fault detector 1 extracts the device address and the alarm factor type from the fault alarm data and adds the time data indicating the current time to it. The alarm data “time, device address, alarm factor type” is transferred to the input / output control unit 2. The input / output control unit 2 displays the transferred alarm data as a failure alarm log on the display device 5 as shown in FIG. As a result, the operator can recognize the time when the failure has occurred, the device address, and the alarm factor type.

The fault detecting section 1 also transfers the alarm data to the fault cause analyzing section 3 at the same time. As a result, the failure cause analysis unit 3 starts the processing shown in FIG.

First, the leading question data determination means 30 of the failure cause analysis unit 3 extracts the device address and the alarm factor type from the transferred alarm data "time, device address, alarm factor type" and uses them as keys. Then, the conversion table 31 is searched. Assuming that the device address is "00010001" and the alarm factor type is "transmission level decrease", the code number "00010008" shown in FIG. 3 is searched. The leading question data determination means 30 determines the data of this code number as the leading question data, notifies the data reading means 32 of the code number, and instructs reading (step S1 of FIG. 4).

The data reading means 32 uses the specified code number "000" from the question / final instruction data storage unit 4.
The data of "10008" is read (step S2). An example of the data of this code number is shown in FIG. The read data is transmitted to the data type determination means 33.

The data type determination means 33 determines whether the read data is question data or final instruction data (step S3). This can be determined by the presence or absence of the choice, because the question data always contains the choices. Since the data shown in FIG. 6 is question data, the question data is transmitted to the skip determination means 34.

The skip determination means 34 determines that the maximum value of the weighting coefficient added to each option in the transmitted question data is larger than a predetermined value, and the other weighting coefficient values are predetermined. Is sufficiently smaller than
It is determined that the question data is skipped, and the question data is transmitted to the skip destination data determination means 35. On the other hand, when such a condition is not satisfied, the question data is transmitted to the display control means 36. Hereinafter, the case of skipping and the case of not skipping will be described separately.

Display control means 36 (when not skipped)
Displays the question data transmitted from the skip determination means 34 on the display device 5 through the input / output control unit 2 (step S5). The operator looks at this question data and selects an option corresponding to the answer by operating the input device 7. In the case of the question data shown in FIG. 6, there is a question “Is streaming detected?”, And the answer options are “1 detected” and “2 not detected”. Also,
The display color of this option is a color corresponding to the value of the weighting coefficient, and the value of the weighting coefficient added to each option is not displayed. In the question data of this example, the probable cause is considered to be: -line failure-transmitter failure of the opposing modulator / demodulator-power off of the opposing modulator-demodulator-error alarm threshold setting. Such additional information is also included, and these are also displayed together. When some kind of monitor or test is required to obtain an answer to a question, a sentence instructing the work is also included in the question data.

Next, the operator answers "1" to the above question.
If the option of “detection” is selected, the number “1” of the option selected together with the code number “00010008” of the question data from the input / output control unit 2 is the next data determining means 37.
Then, the next data determination means 37 adds the option number to the end of the code number of the question data “00010”.
A code number "0081" is generated and the reading is instructed to the data reading means 32 (step S6).

In response to this instruction, the data reading means 32 reads the data (question data) shown in FIG. 7 having the code number “000100081” from the question / final instruction data storage section 4 and sends it to the data type determination means 33. introduce.

(In the case of skipping) The skip destination data determining unit 35 determines the code number of the question data having the largest weighting factor among the plurality of options in the question data transmitted from the skip judging means 34. The code number of the skip destination data is obtained by adding it to the end of the, and the reading is instructed to the data reading means 32. Therefore, for example, if the weighting coefficient of the option of “1 detection” is the maximum of the two options of the question data of FIG. 6, the code number is “00010008”.
1 ”is generated, and the question data shown in FIG. 7 is read.

Now, the following operation will be described assuming that the question data shown in FIG. 7 is read by the data reading means 32 regardless of whether it is skipped or not.

The question data read by the data reading means 32 is judged by the data type judging means 33 to be question data (NO in step S3), and the skip judging means 34 should skip the question data. It is determined whether or not it is (step S4). The weighting factor referred to at this time is the weighting factor added to each of the two options of the question data shown in FIG. If it is determined that the data should be skipped, the process is moved to the skip destination data determination unit 35 to determine the step destination data (step S7), and if not skipped, the process is moved to the display control unit 36. The question data shown in is displayed on the display device 5 (step S5).

As described above, the operation of displaying the question to the operator and inputting the answer is repeated, and the data read by the data reading means 32 is the final instruction data. If it is determined in step S3 (YES in step S3), this final instruction data is sent to the input / output control unit 2 by the display control means 36.
Is displayed on the display device 5 through (step S8). Then, in this final instruction data, the estimated cause of failure and its recovery method are indicated.

Further, the log collecting means 38 includes the fault detecting section 1
The alarm data, the question data and the final instruction data displayed on the display device 5 by the display control means 36 are collected and accumulated as a log, and when the final instruction data is displayed, the log or the log The excerpt is transferred to the printer 6 through the input / output control unit 2 according to a predetermined format, and is printed out as a failure processing request table (step S9). FIG. 8 shows an example of the fault processing request table printed out. In the figure, 81 indicates a failure alarm log, 82 and 83 indicate question data, and 84 indicates final instruction data.

The operator recovers the failure by either performing the recovery operation according to the recovery method displayed on the display device 5 or by requesting the recovery procedure from the failure processing request table printed out from the printer 6. In such a case, if the information (for example, the time, the device address, the type of the alarm factor included in the failure alarm log) for identifying the current failure is input from the input device 7 to instruct to change the question / final instruction data, the weighting factor changing means 39 is activated.

The weighting factor changing means 39 acquires the log for the current failure from the log collecting means 38 and extracts the code numbers of each question data and final instruction data. Then, 1 is added to the weighting factor of the corresponding option of the corresponding question data in the question / final instruction data storage unit 4. That is, the code number of the data displayed after the second is "a.
"aa ... aab", the question data having the code number "aaa ... aa" from which the last digit (b) is removed is searched, and the weighting coefficient of the b-th option in the question data is incremented by one. For example, code number "00010008"
After the question data of, the code number "00010008
When the question data of "1" is presented, the weighting factor of the first option in the question data of code number "00010008" is incremented by +1.

[0050]

As described above, according to the network management apparatus of the present invention, when the fault alarm data is received from the network, the operator is sequentially presented with the questions necessary for estimating the fault cause. Therefore, even if the failure alert data does not correspond to the failure cause on a one-to-one basis, the cause of the failure can be interactively determined by acquiring the necessary data, estimating the failure cause, and finally presenting the recovery method to the operator. Is estimated and the recovery method can be presented to the operator.

Further, since it has a function of skipping a part of the question according to the statistics of the question flow adopted in the past,
It is possible to further simplify the operations and procedures required by the operator for failure analysis.

Further, the question data and the final instruction data are given a code number for identifying them, and when a certain option of certain question data is selected, the question to be presented next. By setting the code number of the data or final instruction data to the code number of the question data having the above options with the option number added to the end, the question data and final instruction data to be presented next can be simplified. It can be calculated by various calculations.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of association between question data and between question data and final instruction data until a certain final instruction data is reached through some question data.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of contents of a conversion table.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing a processing example of a failure cause analysis unit.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing a display example of a fault alarm log.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of question data.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing another example of question data.

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing an example of a failure processing request table printed out at the end of processing.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Failure detection section 2 ... Input / output control section 3 ... Failure cause analysis section 30 ... Head question data determination means 31 ... Conversion table 32 ... Data reading means 33 ... Data type determination means 34 ... Skip determination means 35 ... Skip destination data determination Means 36 ... Display control means 37 ... Next data determination means 38 ... Log collection means 39 ... Weight coefficient changing means 4 ... Question / final instruction data storage unit 5 ... Display device 6 ... Printer 7 ... Input device 8 ... Communication line

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A data group composed of a plurality of final instruction data indicating a recovery method for each estimated cause of failure and a plurality of question data describing a question necessary for estimating the cause of failure. In addition, each question data includes a plurality of options each having a weighting factor for selecting an answer to the question, and each question data has a unique question data or final instruction data to be applied next. Question / final instruction data storage means for storing the question / final instruction data group defined in 1., data reading means for reading out question data or final instruction data from the question / final instruction data storage means, and fault alarm data received from the network First question data determining means for determining the question data to be applied first based on the above and instructing the data reading means to read it , The data read out by the data reading means is a question data or the final instruction data, and the question data is determined based on the weighting factor of each option in the question data determined by the decision means. A skip determination means for determining whether or not to skip, and when the skip determination means determines to skip, determine question data or final instruction data corresponding to the option having the maximum weighting coefficient in the question data. Skip destination data determining means for instructing the data reading means to read the data, and display control means for displaying on the display device the question data determined not to be skipped by the skip determining means and the final instruction data determined by the determining means. If any of the options in the question data displayed on the display device is selected, Of the question data or final instruction data corresponding to the selected option of (1) and the next data determining means for instructing the data reading means to read the data, and the flow of questions when presenting a recovery method useful for recovery from the failure And a weighting factor changing means for adding a weighting factor of a corresponding option of the corresponding question data in the question / final instruction data group based on 2. The network management device according to claim 1, wherein, in addition to displaying the final instruction data on the display device, the printer prints out as a part of the failure processing request table. 3. The question data and the final instruction data include:
A code number for identifying them is given, and when a certain option of certain question data is selected, the code number of question data or final instruction data to be presented next has that option. 3. The network management device according to claim 1, wherein the code number of the question data is a code number obtained by adding the option number to the end of the code number.