Patent ID: 7469279

Claim:
A method of automatically re-provisioning a network element in adaptation to a failure, the method comprising the computer-implemented steps of: identifying a network element that has failed; a cluster manager selecting a substitute network element from among a pool of one or more available network elements to replace the specific network element identified as failing; the cluster manager receiving connection configuration information from the specific network element identified as failing; wherein the cluster manager is communicatively coupled to a cluster comprising a plurality of active network elements, the pool of one or more available network elements, a first network switch, and a second network switch; based on the connection configuration information, the cluster manager re-configuring the substitute network element and one or more switch devices associated with the identified network element, wherein the re-configuring causes the one or more switch devices to change one or more connections from the identified network element to the substitute network element; the cluster manager managing a plurality of connection objects corresponding to the number of subscribers in the network; wherein a connection object comprises a programmatic object that points to a fixed defined set of templates and contains attributes providing specific substitution values to be used when instantiating the templates into actual configurations; and the cluster manager logically re-associating all of the plurality of connection objects of the specific network element identified as failing with the new network element selected from the pool of available substitute network elements.