Telephonic communications – Diagnostic testing – malfunction indication – or electrical... – Of centralized switching system
Reexamination Certificate
2000-02-29
2004-06-29
Barnie, Rexford (Department: 2643)
Telephonic communications
Diagnostic testing, malfunction indication, or electrical...
Of centralized switching system
C379S009040, C379S009020, C379S001010, C379S032010, C379S029090, C379S029100
Reexamination Certificate
active
06757357
ABSTRACT:
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
Not Applicable.
FEDERALLY SPONSORED RESEARCH
Not Applicable.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed to a method of responding to an equipment and/or system failure and, more particularly, to a method of preparing a telecommunication bridge that may be accessed by a group of people, whereby information may be shared and the resolution effort of all involved individuals and equipment may be centrally managed and coordinated.
2. Description of the Invention Background
Failures that require input from diverse disciplines for prompt resolution commonly occur in large systems. For example, a regional telephone provider may experience thousands of service failures each day. Many of those failures may effect only one or a few customers and may be resolved by an individual or small group of people dispatched to the locality of the failure. Failures that effect a large group of customers, however, pose providers with a difficult situation because such major failures are often more difficult to troubleshoot and resolve and can simultaneously demand prompt resolution because of the number of customers effected by the failure.
Major failures have commonly been resolved by bringing people together in a particular facility that has become aware of the failure. In large systems, however, that method can be inefficient. For example, a regional telecommunications provider may have multiple facilities for sensing system failures. A major failure is often sensed at more than one facility, and the sensed data for a single failure may vary from one facility to another. When the traditional failure resolution method is employed, each facility that senses the failure may attempt to correct the failure separately and with only the sensed data available at that facility. That method can result in effort duplication and ineffective use of resources. In addition, those working to resolve the problem utilizing the prior method often work with less than all available data regarding the failure because they lack communication with other facilities that may be sensing other parameters or system functionality. Ultimately, the traditional failure resolution method results in wasted time and money.
Thus, a need exists for a method and system for resolving major failures in multi-faceted systems.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
In accordance with a particularly preferred form of the present invention, there is provided a failure response method. The method includes preparing a bridge having an address of a telecommunication system for common access by a predetermined group of resources, sending an alpha communication communicating the telecommunication system address to the predetermined group of resources, coordinating the resources through the bridge to correct the failure, and sending a final message to the predetermined group of resources by the telecommunication system when the failure has been corrected.
A failure response system is also provided. The failure response system includes a storage device containing contact data for a predetermined group of resources to be utilized when responding to a failure and an address of a telecommunication system for common access by the predetermined group of resources. The system also includes a processor containing instructions which, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to retrieve the contact data for the predetermined group of resources from the storage device, retrieve the address of the telecommunication system from the storage device and send an alpha communication communicating the telecommunication system address to the predetermined group of resources.
A computer readable medium having stored thereon instructions which, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to retrieve contact data for the predetermined group of resources from a storage device, retrieve a telecommunication system address from the storage device, and send an alpha communication communicating the telecommunication system address to the predetermined group of resources is also provided.
Thus, the present invention offers the feature of permitting a major failure in a multi-faceted system to be resolved quickly and efficiently.
The present invention furthermore beneficially permits information pertaining to the failure and resources for correcting the failure to be pooled together.
Another benefit of the present invention is that it beneficially allows personnel and resources in more than one location to combine their efforts when resolving a failure and minimizes duplicative and counter-productive efforts.
REFERENCES:
patent: 5946372 (1999-08-01), Jones et al.
patent: 6301336 (2001-10-01), Branton, Jr. et al.
patent: 6389112 (2002-05-01), Stewart et al.
patent: 6411678 (2002-06-01), Tomlinson, Jr. et al.
patent: 6449365 (2002-09-01), Hodges et al.
patent: 6480469 (2002-11-01), Moore et al.
Finch Arthur E.
Gaines Michael D.
Hargrove James Michael
Horton Ronald L.
Keaton Lawrence T.
Barnie Rexford
BellSouth Intellectual Property Corporation
Kirkpatrick & Lockhart LLP
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