Patent ID: 6125458
Filing Date: 2000-09-26
Classification: H04M,H04Q

Abstract:
A method of operating a fault management system for a telecommunications network, said telecommunications network including a switch and an access network of terminating circuits connecting said switch to terminal equipment provided for users of the telecommunications network, each of said terminating circuits passing through a series of nodes between said switch and its respective terminal equipment, said fault management system comprising:circuit testing apparatus arranged to perform circuit tests on said terminating circuits; anda computer system for controlling the circuit testing apparatus, said computer system including a store containing data relating to said terminating circuits and said nodes;said method comprising the following steps performed by said computer system:instructing said circuit testing apparatus to perform a circuit test on each circuit of at least a subset of said terminating circuits and to produce a test result for each circuit tested;converting the test results into circuit scores each of which is indicative of the operational quality of the tested circuit; andfor each node of at least a subset of said nodes, combining the circuit scores of the tested circuits passing through the node to produce a node score which is indicative of the operational quality of the node.