Patent Document ID: 20180062958
Application ID: 15247385
Patent Flag: 0

Claim One:
1. A method for identifying network ports responsible for packet loss or delay, the method comprising: modeling a network in terms of edge nodes, core nodes, ports, links, and paths wherein: edge nodes are connected to external entities and to one core node; each link connects to two nodes, the nodes comprising edge nodes or core nodes; each link connects to a node using a port at the node; and each path begins and ends at an edge node; for a network path, defining a set x as {x 1 , x 2 , x 3. .. , x N } for N number of total ports in the network, wherein x 1 =1 when the network path passes through port i, otherwise x 1 =0 when the network path does not pass through port i; for the network path, defining a binary value function ƒ(x) indicating whether a bad port criterion is satisfied for the network path, wherein ƒ(x)=1 when the bad port criterion is satisfied, and ƒ(x)=0 when the bad port criterion is not satisfied; and applying an iterative procedure to determine a neural network function {circumflex over (ƒ)}(x) for every ƒ(x) corresponding to a plurality of network paths in the network, the neural network function {circumflex over (ƒ)}(x) given by f ^ ( x ) = o [ ∑ i = 0 N w i x i ] wherein w i is a weight factor for each x i , and o is a general step function given by o ( z ) = { 0 z ≤ 0 1 z > 0 } ; upon convergence of the weight factors w i using the iterative procedure, determining ƒ(x) based on {circumflex over (ƒ)}(x) to identify ports in the network satisfying the bad port criteria as bad ports; and sending a service notification to a network administrator of the network, the service notification indicating the bad ports.