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Abstract

An improved method and apparatus of resolving faults in a communications network. The preferred system uses a trouble ticket data structure to describe communications network faults. Completed trouble tickets are stored in a library and when an outstanding trouble ticket is received, the system uses at least one determinator to correlate the outstanding communications network fault to data fields in the set of data fields of the trouble ticket data structure to determine which completed trouble tickets in the library are relevant to the outstanding communications network fault. The system retrieves a set of completed trouble tickets from the library that are similar to the outstanding trouble ticket and uses at least a portion of the resolution from at least one completed trouble ticket to provide a resolution of the outstanding trouble ticket. The determinators may be macros, rules, a decision tree derived from an information theoretic induction algorithm and/or a neural network memory derived from a neural network learning algorithm. The system may adapt the resolution from a retrieved trouble ticket to provide the resolution using null adaptation, parameterized adaptation, abstraction/respecialization adaptation, or critic-based adaptation techniques.

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First Claim