Methods and apparatus for providing adaptive private network centralized management system timestamp correlation processes

A method for adapting a system timeline at an adaptive private network (APN) virtual machine based on correlated monitoring of appliances in an APN having time jumps that occur at the appliances, the method comprising:

• providing an APN virtual machine that maintains an APN time used for forwarding packets through conduits in the APN;
• providing an APN appliance that forwards packets through the conduits in the APN and that maintains time local to the APN;
• receiving, at the first APN virtual machine, statistics from the APN appliance, each of the statistics including a timestamp recorded in the local time of the APN and state information regarding the APN appliance, wherein the first APN virtual machine comprises monitor, manager, and network statistics processing functions which are configured to provide a consistent system timeline;
• determining, by the first APN virtual machine and using the timestamps associated with successive statistics received from the APN appliance, a time jump in the local time of the APN appliance that does not correspond to a timestamping interval between the successive statistics;
• and
• adjusting, by the first APN virtual machine and using the time jump, the timestamps of the statistics received from the APN appliance to correlate in time the statistics received from the APN appliance with statistics received from other nodes in the APN on the consistent system timeline and the time correlated received node statistics provided at a program accessible storage location.

A computer readable non-transitory medium storing a computer program which causes a computer system to perform a method to provide a consistent system timeline of node communications in an adaptive private network (APN) having a plurality of nodes, the method comprising:

• providing a first APN virtual machine that maintains an APN time used for forwarding packets through conduits in the APN;
• providing an APN appliance that forwards packets through the conduits in the APN and that maintains time local to the APN appliance;
• repeatedly sending statistics request messages from the first APN virtual machine to the APN appliance, wherein the first APN virtual machine comprises monitor, manager, and network statistics processing functions which are configured to provide the consistent system timeline and each of the statistics request messages contains a timestamp tn of when the message was sent in the APN time maintained by the first APN virtual machine;
• receiving each of the statistics request messages at the APN appliance and recording a timestamp ta in the local time of the APN appliance when each of the statistics request messages was received at the APN appliance;
• in response to each received statistics request message, returning requested node statistics to the first from the APN appliance to the first APN virtual machine, wherein the requested node statistics each include a timestamp recorded in the local time of the APN appliance and state information regarding the APN appliance;
• determining, by the first APN virtual machine and using the timestamps associated with successive statistics received from the APN appliance, a time jump in the local time of the APN appliance that does not correspond to a timestamping interval between the successive statistics;
• and
• adjusting, by the first APN virtual machine and using the time jump, the timestamps of the statistics received from the APN appliance to form adjusted node statistics which are included in the consistent system timeline of node communications in the network at the first APN virtual machine, wherein the consistent system timeline is provided for presentation through a network attached user interface.