By using monitoring data, feedback data, and pooling of failure data from a plurality
of electronic devices, real-time failure prediction and diagnoses of electronic
systems operating in a network environment can be achieved. First, the diagnostic
system requests data on the state of a machine and/or its components and collections
thereof as part of the machine's normal operation. Secondly, real-time processing
of the data either at the machine site or elsewhere in the distributed network
allows for predicting or diagnosing system failures. Having determined and/or predicted
a system failure, a communication to one or more remote observers in the network
allows the remote observers to view the diagnostic information and/or required
action to repair the failure. Furthermore, interrogation of either the particular
electronic system, or a database containing data on similar electronic systems
by the diagnostic server allows the diagnostic server to refine original diagnoses
based on this population data to achieve a comprehensive failure predication/diagnosing system.
