Probe station placement algorithm for probe set reduction in network fault detection and localization

Fault diagnosis is a central aspect of network fault management. Since faults are unavoidable in communication systems, their quick detection and isolation is essential for the robustness, reliability, and accessibility of a system. Fault localization is done using probing, monitoring, with agents, agent less, through WMI etc. Probing technique for fault localization involves placement of probe stations (Probe stations are specially instrumented nodes from where probes can be sent to monitor the network) which affects the diagnosis capability of the probes sent by the probe stations. Probe station locations affect probing efficiency, monitoring capability, and deployment cost. At the same time, probe station selection affects the selection of probe set for fault localization. We are presenting a novel approach for minimal probe station selection with an objective to reduce probe set size that will be used for fault localization. The probe station selected through this approach results into reduced deployment cost as well as it helps in producing smaller probe set for fault localization reducing overall operation cost. We provide experimental evaluation of the proposed algorithm and provided analysis of same with Shadow Node Reduction (SNR) algorithm through simulation results.