Patent ID: 7330889

Claim:
A computer network interconnecting a plurality of service providing nodes each including software elements for performing computer network tasks and an administrative node for monitoring the computer network tasks, at least one of the service providing nodes comprising: a plurality of software elements in an application layer of the service providing node for coupling to other software elements in the same application layer and in the application layers of other service providing nodes of the network to process operations of the network; an interceptor unit for each software element of the at least one service providing node, the interceptor unit being coupled to its software element in response to selection of the software element by the administrative node for intercepting transmissions in the application layer from the selected software element to other software elements in the same and different service providing nodes and for intercepting transmissions in the application layer to the selected software element from other software elements in the same and different service providing nodes wherein said interceptor unit further forms a record of information pertaining to the transmissions at the selected software element and each record of transmission pertaining information further comprises a chain correlation identifier to identify an operation of a selected software element in its performance of a network task and an interaction correlation identifier to identify an interaction of a selected software element with another software element; and a transfer unit responsive to a transfer command from the administrative node to the selected software element for transferring the record pertaining to transmission pertaining information from the interceptor unit to the administrative node, in order to monitor operations of network tasks.