Intelligent fault management for large networks

Enterprise computer networks are rapidly increasing in size and complexity. A typical enterprise network consists of numerous hardware architectures, communication protocols, and user interface technologies. High availability and performance requirements place a high demand on the management of such networks. The need to increase efficiency often results in the decline in the ratio between the network operators and the network elements being managed, resulting in a loss of network availability and service. In such scenarios it is essential to integrate an expert system into the network management architecture to transform network events into value-added information enabling the network operators to efficiently manage the network. In this paper we present details of an intelligent network management system which is successfully being used to manage a large Internet service provider network