Patent ID: 6983317

Claim:
A computer network, the computer network including a plurality of managed sites, wherein each of the managed sites comprises: a. at least one manager engine computer coupled to a plurality of managed nodes, the at least one manager engine computer including a management software component, the management software component being capable of retrieving and storing data representative of network system state information, the network system state information comprising relationships among a plurality of managed network elements, wherein at least one of the plurality of managed network elements corresponds to one of the plurality of managed nodes, and wherein the plurality of managed network elements comprise at least one physical element and at least one of a software application, and a software subroutine; and b. at least one client computer coupled to the at least one manager engine computer, the at least one client computer including a data retrieval software component, the data retrieval software component being capable of retrieving the data representative of network system state information from the at least one manager engine computer and of presenting the data representative of network system state information to a user.