Evaluating network serviceability

The capability to manage network operations on a day-to-day basis has becom e an important area of concern given the rapid expansion of computer networ ks. A related, but much less studied area, is the impact that the design of a network has on the ease with which it can be serviced. Evaluating the ea se of servicing the network and its components does not concentrate on day- to-day operations of the network, but rather examines the network design ov er a longer term to identify problematic components, configurations and dep endencies between components based on expert knowledge and historical data. This paper reports on our experience with a system to evaluate the ease of servicing a network-its serviceability-given a description of its design. T he motivation for the work is that computer networks are more often ''grown '' than ''designed'' without concern for serviceability issues. The work al so examines the impact of dependencies between components on the role of se rvice and the potential disruption costs caused by these dependencies. This work is important because it is pro-active in explicitly considering the r ole of servicing a network when changing the components or configuration of a network. This approach is in contrast to network management, which is re active in dealing with problems. The paper reports on a successful implemen tation of such as system and our experiences with it. (C) 1998 Elsevier Sci ence B.V. All rights reserved.