1. A method of quantifying a weld's quality by monitoring an electric arc welder as the electric arc welder performs a selected arc welding process by creating actual welding parameters between an advancing wire and a workpiece, said selected arc welding process controlled by command signals to a power supply of said electric arc welder, said method comprising: (a) generating a series of rapidly repeating wave shapes, each wave shape constituting a weld cycle with a cycle time; (b) dividing said wave shapes into states; (c) measuring a plurality of selected weld parameters occurring in one or more of said states at an interrogation rate over a period of time repeatedly during said arc welding process; (d) calculating a plurality of quality parameters for each of said states based on said measurements of said selected weld parameters during said welding process; (e) comparing a value of each of said quality parameters calculated for each period of time to a corresponding expected quality parameter value to determine if a difference between said calculated quality parameter value and said expected quality parameter value exceeds a predetermined threshold; and (f) when said difference exceeds said predetermined threshold, weighting said calculated quality parameter value with a magnitude weight based on said difference, and weighting said calculated quality parameter value with a time contribution weight based on a time contribution of its state to the wave shape including said state, wherein said quality parameters represent an overall quality measurement of said weld.