Secrets of creating the best Network Management Software

Very often I am invited to review new network related software products from other companies as an expert

in workflow and UI  optimization.  I always start with asking who designed the User Interface

and I see that in many cases user interface designer and a coder is the same person  and that where all the problems originate.

Golden rules of best software design:

User interface defines functionality so start with it.

User interface has to be designed by Subject Matter Expert not by a coder.

Person who designs UI may haven’t written a single line of code in his life, but he knows the work flow of the trade.

Start coding it only after UI is complete.

Additionally..

If you developing best Network Management software, SME has to get involved in DB design in very early stages:

It is Network Export who must decide how to call fields in SQL table that will be holding BGP session information not a DBA.

It is Network Expert who must decide how to call columns in JavaScript table that User will be seeing in reports not a Web designer.

It is Network Expert who has to check with C++ coder how he named those procedures that will be used to read ISIS peering info.

This may sounds like micromanaging, but this is what my 20 years experience in managing software development projects  tells me..

Download Best Network Management Software

 

/by

Cisco SmartNet validation automation with Nectus

,

One of the key features of Nectus is ability to get instant SmartNet validation for any piece of Cisco hardware  you have.

SmartNet validation is implemented via “Cisco Smart API” interface available for selected customers with SNTC (SmartNet Total Care) or

Partners with PSS (Partner Support Service) agreements.

Nectus SmartNet validation requires API account (Client ID and Client Secret). Contact your local Cisco rep to apply for one.

Following SmartNet reports are currently implemented in Nectus:

  1. SmartNet coverage status
  2. End of Sales Status
  3. End of Support Status
  4. Current list of Bugs for each platform + IOS combination
  5. Recommended version of IOS for each hardware platform

To access SmartNet reports to go “Reports -> Cisco SmartNet Reports” in Nectus GUI

 

Download Nectus 60 day trial

/by

Using Nectus for Cisco VIRL Topology monitoring

,

One of the limitations of VIRL that it does not provide real-time visual Up-Down status for Interfaces in your VIRL topology.

Pairing VIRL with Nectus give you best of both worlds. To allow Nectus to monitor your VIRL topology

enable and configure SNMP on your VIRL routers and ensure L3 reachibility  between your VIRL subnets and

Nectus Server IP address.   Define VIRL subnet in Nectus  “Settings” -> “Network Discovery”  and manually start discovery or

define discovery frequency which can be as low as every 6 min.  After Discovery finishes your should be able to see your VIRL topology in Nectus GUI.

Enable monitoring for Interfaces to allow Nectus to send SNMP polls every 30 sec to each virtual router’s interface.

 

Download 60 day Nectus trial

 

/by

Nectus Licensing and Pricing

Nectus is licensed by module with the following modules available:

  1. Basic Network Monitoring
  2. Network Topology Visualization
  3. Wireless Monitoring
  4. AWS Monitoring
  5. Windows Server Monitoring
  6. Linux Server Monitoring
  7. NetFlow Collector
  8. Syslog Collector
  9. MS SQL Monitoring
  10. HTTP Server Monitoring
  11. Cisco SmartNet Reporting
  12. IPAM
  13. Configuration Backup and Management

 

Each module has different pricing brackets based on number of supported devices.

Annual Maintenance and Support is 20% of the license price.

Contact sales@nectus5.com for your personal quote.

First Year Support is free.

Download 60 day trial

 

 

 

/by

Nectus version 1.2.15 released.

Build 1.2.15 released for selected POC customers.    Download

Current list of major features that are available out of the box without special licensing:

  1. Network Discovery
  2. Network Monitoring (SNMP v2/v3)
  3. Netflow Collector (requires second VM for storage)
  4. Syslog Server
  5. SNMP trap Server
  6. Network Topology Visualization
  7. HTTP URL Monitoring
  8. SQL Server Monitoring (new feature)
  9. Windows Server Monitoring
  10. Command Scripting
  11. Routers Configuration backup and change tracking
  12. Ping plotter
  13. Web based SSH client
  14. SNMP Walk with GUI

 

/by

Why managing some network monitoring tools is a full time job?

Recently I was pinged in LinkedIn by some recruiter for a job with a title “Splunk Network Architect”.

I am not a job market but I guess some of the keywords it my profile rang a bell in their matching script
but what startled me is the job title: “Splunk Network Architect”.. Since when managing software tools becomes a full time job?
The golden rule here is: When software tool takes more times to manage than it saves, it is time to get rid of it.

With Nectus you don’t have to write custom Perl/Python scripts to get what you need, It is our developers’ job.
With Nectus you don’t have to install third-party macros… It is our developers’ job.
With Nectus you don’t need more than 5 mouse clicks to get any report. We actually counted it.
With Nectus you don’t have to hire full time Architect to manage it.
Nectus GUI is very intuitive, we have seen CEOs login and use it without any formal training :)
The most common words we hear when people see our Demo is: “Cool”, “Awesome”, “Where were you when we bought [network tool name]”?

Try it yourself for 60 days
https://nectus5.com/download/

/by

Nectus sets new record in Netflow Collector speed: 50,000 flows per second

,

Today we have achieved a new millstone with our Netflow collector performance:
50,000 flows per second processing speed was reached in Windows Server 2016 VM.
This rate was reached on VM with 64GB RAM and 1TB M2 SSD.
To simulate this flow rate we used 10 isolated instances of Netflow generator from Virtual Console (www.vconsole.com) with each instance generating 5Kf/sec.
There is no Netflow collector on the market that we are aware which can sustain this Netflow packet rate.
This explains why large cloud providers turn to Nectus for their Netflow processing needs when other tools fails to deliver.

Download 60 day trial:     Nectus Download

/by

We will update all of your network diagrams while you asleep..

,

Keeping your Visio network diagrams up-to-date is a full time job and not a fun one.
For any decent size network there are always changes happen every day and it is almost
impossible to keep track of those not to mention about adding those changes manually in Visio files.
The time of manual, static network diagramming is over.
Nectus (www.nectus5.com) is a a tool that makes all the manual work from network diagram creation process obsolete.
Nectus is the most advanced network discovery tool on the market that can generate network diagram
of any part of you network. You only need to pick a starting point, right-click and Select
“Expand Network Topology” and awesome looking network topology based on information from daily network discovery
will be ready in seconds. Network diagrams are based on database of “interconnections” discovered
via CDP and LLDP protocols which Nectus uses during its scheduled discovery jobs.
So as long as you run your discovery every night you can wake up every day knowing that that all of your
network diagrams are up to date.

/by

Microsoft SQL Server Monitoring added to Nectus 1.2.16

Version 1.2.16 released on November 15, 2017 added ability to monitor Microsoft SQL Servers. Monitoring for 75 different SQL server metrics.
Server, Instance and Database level statistics.

Dashboard Example:

/by

HTTP URL Monitoring functionality added to Nectus 1.2.10

Starting from Nectus version 1.2.10 we added ability to monitor any HTTP URLs for up/down status and latency.

Configurable polling intervals  and URL dashboard added to standard list of dashboards.

“URL Down” alerts can be sent via email or SMS/text messages.  GSM Modem is required for text based alerts.

/by

How to simulate Netflow packets for testing purposes..

,

We offer NetFlow Traffic Generator utility that can send up to 30k flows per second with randomized parameters.

This tool is ideal for anyone who is developing Netflow Collector functionality.

Allows to generate large amount of NetFlow packets for protocol versions: 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 as if they were coming from real routers or switches.

Windows GUI provides control for every single parameter of the NetFlow packets.

Randomizaton of flow data. Support for multiple collectors. Simulation for up to 5000 routers.

Runs on any Windows OS.

Download Netflow Generator

/by

Displaying real-time interface utilization on Network Diagrams

This is an example of how Nectus  overlays real-time performance data on top of network diagrams.

 

/by

Future of Network Visualization

If you still using Visio for your network diagrams you are a dinosaur. You may be very good at it and have millions of very nice

looking stencils  but your network diagram becomes obsolete the moment  you finished working on it.

Network diagram made in Visio is what your think your network diagram looks like but not what it actually is.

Network changes every day, every minute, every second. Links goes down, IGP flaps, Spanning tree re-converges,  BGP Churns.

Can you see all of that in Visio? Does your network diagram shows all the the action?

Can you see traffic distribution among LACP bundle members right on your network diagram in real time?

Can you spot asymmetric routing when you looks at Visio?

Modern JavaScript opens doors to an unlimited opportunities to making great web-based network diagrams on demand with

all the real time information overlaid.

If your Network mapping software does not give you all of that may be you are not using the right one?

/by

Storage and Memory Utilization Monitoring for Windows Servers and VM

Starting from version 1.2.7 Nectus adds new “Storage and Memory Utilization” reports for Windows and Linux Servers (VMs or Standalone)

We can monitor and alert on: Low HDD free space, High RAM or High Virtual Memory utilization for any Windows/Linux Server.

Reports are based on SNMP hrStorageEntry OID (1.3.6.1.2.1.25.2.3.1)

/by

High Performance (30K flows per second) Netflow collector added to Nectus starting from version 1.2.6

,

Following Netflow reports are available for all Nectus Suite users starting from version 1.2.6

  1. Top Flows by Protocols
  2. Top Flows by Application
  3. Top Flows by BGP AS Source + Destination
  4. Top Flows by BGP AS Source
  5. Top Flows by BGP AS Destination
  6. Top Flows by IP Source + Destination
  7. Top Flows by IP Source
  8. Top Flows by IP Destination
  9. Top Flows by Source Countries
  10. Top Flow by Destination Countries

All reports are supplied with  IP Geolocation information. Netflow collector is a licence free component of Nectus suite.

Supported Netflow formats: V5, V9, IPFIX

Max number of flows per second: 30,000

Netflow collector runs on a dedicated VM or standalone server with following recommended specs:

OS: Windows 64 Bit

RAM: 32GB+

HDD: 1TB SSD

/by

Just a nice pic. Cloning network topology..

,

You can clone network topology diagram to multiple windows for up to 5 x 5 grid  an overlay different information in each cell

 

 

 

/by

Preventing false positives during device UP/DOWN Status monitoring

It is important to distinguish between monitored device “down” event and event when monitoring application itself loses network connection.

When network monitoring application itself losses network connectivity it should not result in alert emails or text messages with monitored device

down events as it would be classified as false positive alerts.

To monitor its own network connectivity Nectus Server uses default ICMP probe for its default gateway with an inter- packet delay 3x faster

than normally used for monitoring all the devices. This allows Nectus monitoring service to detect loss of network connection faster than any of the normal device probes

would return “device down” alert.  If Nectus server detects that it lost network connection it stops all monitoring activity for 5 min.

/by

Why not all of my network devices are discovered?

,

Here is the list of the the possible reasons why some of the network devices can be missing after Network Discovery:

  1. SNMP is not configured or misconfigured  on missing device (Test SNMP operation via Tools -> SNMP Walk).
  2. SNMP ACL on missing device does not permit requests from Nectus IP Address  (Test SNMP operation via Tools -> SNMP Walk).
  3. IP address of the missing network device is outside of the range of configured subnets in Network Discovery and CDP is disabled on missing device.
  4. IP address of the missing network device is outside of the range of configured subnets in Network Discovery and device is located inside isolated CDP domain.
  5. There a Firewall between missing device and Nectus and it block ICMP and /or SNMP traffic.
/by

How Nectus finds rogue or misconfigured SNMP devices

,

During installation user must provide a standard corporate SNMP v2 or v3 Read-only credentials to be used for network discovery.

For each live IP address Nectus tries to use standard SNMP parameters as a first choice  but in addition to standard credentials Nectus attempts

to use some of the well-known SNMP strings such as v2 community “public”, “private”, “cisco”, etc.

This approach helps to find  rogue or misconfigiured devices that would normally be left undiscovered and pose a potential security issues.

To manage list of  “well-known” SNMP profiles go to “Settings -> Network Discovery Settings”.

/by