1. A computer implemented method for computing path oriented statistics, the computer implemented method comprising: determining a transaction path for each transaction in a plurality of transactions to be processed by a processor unit in a network data processing system; determining a combined transaction path, wherein the combined transaction path is a set of one or more transaction paths starting at a same hop; monitoring a statistic from all components in the combined transaction path, wherein the statistic is a statistic that is to be transformed into a plurality of composite statistics; calculating a hop weight for each hop using the statistic to form a calculated hop weight, wherein the statistic includes an average time spent at a hop and the hop weight is a fractional unit; determining a most important hop; adjusting the calculated hop weight using the statistic; calculating a composite statistic for each component at each hop using an adjusted hop weight, wherein the composite statistic includes composite statistics for downstream hops; and combining the composite statistic for each component of the combined transaction path to form an overall composite statistic for the combined transaction path.