Patent ID: 8279869

Claim:
A method comprising: extracting a sequence number from a Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) message, wherein the extracting is performed by a first device, the TCP message is being conveyed from a network interface to a TCP stack, and the sequence number is an acknowledged sequence number indicating a most recently received sequence number that was received by a sender of the TCP message prior to sending the TCP message; inserting the copy of the sequence number into a new TCP message, wherein the inserting is performed by the first device; sending the new TCP message to a second device, wherein the sending is performed by the first device, a sequence number of the new TCP message comprises the sequence number, the new TCP message comprises information configured to facilitate identifying a dependency between a local application executed by the second device and a second application executed the first device, wherein the identifying is performed by the second device, and the identifying comprises: detecting that the second application is identified by a true address of the second application and the local application is identified by a translated address of the local application, and transmitting the information to a relationship discovery agent executed by the second device; sending the information from the relationship discovery agent of the second device to a relationship discovery server indicating that the second application and the local application are communicating with each other; and determining that the second application and the local application are communicating with each other by correlating the information received from the relationship discovery agent of the second device with another information, that indicates the second application is identified by the true address and the local application is identified by the translated address, wherein the another information is received from a relationship discovery agent of the first device, and wherein the determining is performed by the relationship discovery server.