Patent ID: 8458323

Claim:
A system for associating problem tickets based on an integrated network and customer database, comprising: a processor; a data retriever that, when executed by the processor, retrieves router configurations from data stores for routers in a service provider network; a data analysis tool that, when executed by the processor, parses the router configurations to create port data for each port on each router in the service provider network, wherein the port data for each port on each router includes a customer name, integrates the port data with customer data to create an integrated database, wherein each customer data is associated with one of a plurality of customers, and wherein the integrating comprises matching the customer name included in the port data for each port to a corresponding one of the plurality of customers associated with each customer data, assigns a plurality of ports to a plurality of user defined groups in the integrated database based on applying a set of user defined rules, wherein at least one of the plurality of ports is assigned to multiple user defined groups, accesses a problem management system to identify a first problem ticket and a second problem ticket, wherein the first problem ticket lacks an association with the second problem ticket in the problem management system, and wherein the first problem ticket and the second problem ticket are different tickets associated with different problems, identifies a first port associated with the first problem ticket and a second port associated with the second problem ticket, wherein the first port and the second port are different physical or logical ports, determines whether one of the plurality of user defined groups comprises the first port and the second port, and creates an association between the first problem ticket and the second problem ticket in response to a determination that the one of the plurality of user defined groups comprises the first port and the second port; and a user interface that, when executed by the processor, displays the created association between the first problem ticket and the second problem ticket to troubleshoot associated tickets.