Patent ID: 7603461

Claim:
A machine-implemented method, comprising: detecting an event and determining whether the event contributes to an existing hypothesis about a network resource or if the event warrants a new hypothesis; updating collaborative evidence associated with the existing hypothesis or the new hypothesis in response to the event; deciding whether the evidence meets a threshold for confirming a problem with the network resource or denying the problem with the network resource; and propagating the existing hypothesis or the new hypothesis along with the updated evidence to one or more other network participants, wherein the existing hypothesis or the new hypothesis is represented as a message that includes an identity of a detector for the event, an identity of the network resource, and the updated evidence, the updated evidence including a positive value when the updated evidence confirms the hypothesis and a negative value when the updated evidence contradicts the hypothesis, and wherein the message is sent to the one or more network participants, the detector also has an associated sensitivity that is an accuracy profile for the detector in identifying the problem, the sensitivity is equal to a total number of true positive problems identified by the detector divided by a sum comprising the total number of the true positives problems plus a total number of false negative problems identified by the detector, and wherein the sensitivity is derived from a confusion matrix that is a table of properties representing an ability of the detector to detect previous problems.