System and method for correlating transaction messages in a communications network

Abstract

A system and method for processing transaction signaling units is disclosed. A plurality of interlinked network monitoring devices capture signaling units on links in a communications network. The signaling units have unique transaction identifiers which correlate the signaling unit to a specific transaction. The monitoring devices comprise a number of processors, each of the transactions is assigned to a specific processor. The system collects all of the signaling units for each transactions and combine the signaling units into a plurality of transaction records. The processors are capable of correlating multiple detections of individual messages and sorting the individual signaling units into time order. A processor receives signaling units from the communications links and determines whether it is responsible for processing the transaction that corresponds to the signaling units. If the processor has been assigned the corresponding transaction, then the signaling unit is processed locally. Otherwise the signaling unit is forwarded to another processor either on the same monitor or on a different monitor. Signaling units can only be forwarded within each monitor once and they can only be transferred among the monitors once. A table comprising processing instructions for each transaction is maintained by each processor. The table is used to route each signaling unit to the proper processor for the corresponding transaction.