Patent ID: 8041807

Claim:
A method for determining a number of users being served by a target system, said method comprising the steps of: a processor of the target system running, at a pre-determined point-in-time, a data collection script for collecting a set of user data from the target system that is remotely coupled to a monitoring system, wherein the monitoring system runs a monitoring application comprising a data collection tool, wherein the data collection tool comprises: a user identity module, a mail accounts module, a data collection script, a mail script, a utility script, a communication interface module, and a data report module, wherein the target system runs components of the data collection tool that are previously deployed on the target system by the monitoring application, wherein the target system is a member to a geographical region, wherein said set of user data collected for the target system comprises: total number of users daily, total number of users hourly, average number of users daily, total number of users in he geographical region daily, total number of users in the geographical region hourly, average number of users daily in he geographical region, a first time of login by a user, a business group to which the user belongs, wherein the business group is a member to the geographical region, and a second time of logout by the user; and generating, by use of the mail script running on the target system, one or more electronic transmissions comprising said set of user data collected from said running; and the method further comprising: retrieving, by the monitoring application, the generated one or more electronic transmissions from the target system by use of the utility script module that is configured to load the generated one or more electronic transmissions into the data collection tool running on the monitoring system, wherein the utility script module is configured to parse content of the transmitted electronic transmission and to update said set of user data stored in a database coupled to the monitoring system; creating an output file comprising said set of user data from the target system by use of the data report module that is configured to generate a data report comprising user statistics for the target system; and transmitting said output file from said monitoring system to a monitoring system client by use of the communication interface module such that the monitoring system client is enabled to customize at least one parameter selected from the group consisting of said pre-determined point-in-time to run the data collection script, a type of data from the set of user data, and combinations thereof; and subsequent to said retrieving, parsing said set of user data loaded from said one or more electronic transmissions; storing said set of user data collected and parsed into the database; and updating, at predetermined intervals, said set of user data stored based on said at least one parameter from said one or more monitoring system clients.