A method and apparatus for determining connections among functional components within a computer system are disclosed. A rule table for describing all interconnections among the components within a computer system is initially constructed. The rule table includes a source functional unit column and a destination functional unit column. A row within the rule table is interrogated to determine if the computer system contains an actual source functional component and an actual destination functional component, according to the respective entries stored within the row. In response to the computer system contains an actual source functional component and an actual destination functional component, a source functional component object is logically connected to a destination functional component object within a hardware object table. The source functional component object corresponds to the actual source functional component, and the destination functional component object corresponds to the actual destination functional component.