Patent ID: 8463940

Claim:
A method of indicating a path in a computer network, comprising: executing a background process that, after initialization, waits for network topology to be determined by a topology unit, creates a listen socket, waits for a client unit to connect, receives a command from the client unit and upon a new node discovery dynamically determines additional nodes in a path from a first node to a second node, the additional nodes including a routing node and a non-routine node, the non-routine node determined from stored topology data, the background process dynamically examining a routing table in the routing node to determine changes in the path, the path includes active path segments allowed by a current spanning tree and path segments allowed by a network topology but not allowed by the current spanning tree; providing information concerning the path to another process that polls nodes, the information including indications of the additional nodes, wherein the another process identifies a point of primary failure in the computer network based on the indications of the additional nodes and information regarding plural paths that exist between the first node and the second node; and providing the information to another process that polls nodes to determine the nodes' accessibility.