Patent ID: 8458316

Claim:
A management apparatus that acquires operating information from a network device and manages an operating history, the apparatus comprising: a determining unit that determines whether the operating information acquired from the network device is usage frequency information for each identifier associated with a user who uses the network device, the usage frequency information being information regarding a function of the network device; a storage unit that stores a first table, a second table and a third table, the first table storing, for each identifier, first information indicating a time when the usage frequency information was first acquired and second information indicating a time when the usage frequency information was last acquired, the second table storing the usage frequency information per identifier acquired from the network device, and the third table storing, as history information, information indicating a time when the usage frequency information per identifier acquired from the network device was acquired as well as the usage frequency information per identifier; an update unit that, when it is determined by the determining unit that the operating information is the usage frequency information per identifier, updates the first table and the third table using the usage frequency information per identifier and the information indicating the time when the usage frequency information was acquired; a receiving unit that receives a request to acquire information for a designated tally period; a tally unit that, in response to the acquisition request, tallies up a usage frequency per identifier during the tally period based on the first table and the third table; and an output unit that outputs tally results obtained by the tally unit, wherein in a case where new usage frequency information per identifier is acquired from the network device, the update unit compares the acquired usage frequency information with the previously acquired usage frequency information per identifier stored in the second table, and performs update by storing, in the third table, usage frequency information of an identifier whose usage frequency has been changed without storing information regarding an identifier whose usage frequency remains the same, and even in a case where information regarding an identifier whose usage frequency information has been acquired during the tally period is not stored in the third table with reference to the first table, the tally unit performs tallying so as to include the information regarding the identifier in the tally results.