Patent ID: 8407170

Claim:
A method for determining a root cause of a problem in a multiple-element system comprising: correlating, by a processor, an incoming alarm signal with an element x in a multiple-element system; using a connectivity map, tracing, by the processor, all elements upstream of the element x; in response to receiving the incoming alarm signal, creating an implication list comprising a list of the traced elements; determining a set of elements that are identified on the implication list and that are also identified on a previously created implication list for an element y correlated with a previously received active alarm signal, wherein the element y is different from the element x; increasing a connection probability associated with each element in the set of elements based on determining that each element in the set of elements is identified on the previously created implication list; calculating a probability for each element on the implication list that the each element on the implication list is root cause of the incoming alarm signal, the probability for some of the elements based at least in part on an associated connection probability; and outputting an identification of at least one element on the implication list as the most-probable root cause of the incoming alarm signal.