Abstract: A method and apparatus for characterizing, organizing, and modeling components of a telecommunications system are presented. The method identifies which components of the system are elements, and which components are behaviors of those elements. The elements and behaviors are further characterized and grouped by like characteristics in a distillation process that generates a set of charts of elements and a set of charts of behaviors. Common characteristics of the charts of elements are discovered and copied to a set of key elements. Similarly, common characteristics of the charts of behaviors are discovered and copied to a set of key behaviors. The characteristics of the system emerge from the characteristics of the key elements and key behaviors. The key behaviors and key elements thus need be the only portions of the database that need be replicated in order to distribute database information about the system as a whole.