Distributed fault management protocol for heterogeneous networks

Since so many diverse systems are placed in the network, without a coherent set of response-actions, the network may be ineffective in recovering from a state of unrest or failure. Typically, after the loss of a signal some equipment may initiate a recovery mechanism, others will sound alarms, and still others will do nothing. In some cases, the alarm propagation causes multiple actions over several protocol layers or a single protocol may handle the event. This paper investigates a master protocol mechanism for coordinating the actions taken by the responding protocols.