Abstract: An apparatus which provides the user with an indication of the computer network's health. The indication is provided by a network management station on the computer network. The network management station has a distributable piece of code which instructs agents to gather diagnostic and status information. The network management station then evaluates the network specific diagnostic and status data gathered by the agents. Based on the evaluation, the network management station generates a representation of the computer network's functionality (i.e., its "health"). Thereby, the user can readily determine whether the computer network requires repairs.

Abstract: A method of configuring a network. The network includes some physical devices, some hosts, and a network management tool. The method comprises the following steps. First, generate a set of leaf nodes. Each leaf node includes at least one physical device and connects to at least one host. Next, generate an adjacency matrix from said set of leaf nodes. Next, generate a set of interconnect nodes, the interconnect nodes connect the set of leaf nodes. Next, determine the resource availability for the set of interconnect nodes. Finally, configure the set of interconnect nodes and the set of leaf nodes after determining that sufficient resources are available.