Patent ID: 7349889

Claim:
A system for diagnosing a fault, the system comprising: a knowledge base including a plurality of fault diagnoses and fault symptom queries, wherein each said fault symptom query includes potential responses and images that correspond to the potential responses; a decision tree module including a decision tree having a plurality of decision points each corresponding to one of the fault symptom queries and a plurality of resolution points each corresponding to one of the fault diagnoses, wherein each said potential response in the decision tree indicates one of the decision points or one of the resolution points and one of said decision points is identified as a starting decision point; and a user interface module in communication with said decision tree module, said knowledge base and a user access device, said user interface module including instructions to implement a method comprising: designating the starting decision point as the next decision point; transmitting the fault symptom query corresponding to the next decision point and an option to view all of the resolution points to the user access device; receiving a reply to the query; determining if the reply includes one of the potential responses or if the reply includes a request to view all of the decision points; in response to determining that the reply includes one of the potential responses; continuing said transmitting, receiving, and determining until said one of the potential responses indicates one of the resolution points or until it is determined that the reply includes a request to view all of the decision points, wherein if said one of the potential responses indicates one of the decision points then said one of the decision points is designated as the next decision point; and transmitting the fault diagnosis corresponding to said one of the resolution points to the user access device; and in response to determining that the reply includes a request to view all of the resolution points; transmitting diagnostic images associated with each of the resolution points in the decision tree to the user access device, thereby allowing a user to diagnose a fault without having to respond to queries for traversing the decision tree.