Salvatore Salamone
The term LAN management can refer to a myriad of tasks, ranging from the management of such devices as bridges or hubs on a network to managing servers, PCs, and software. However, one key element that people often neglect is the management of the physical network, including mundane but critical elements like cabling, connectors, and faceplates.
Network downtime costs U.S. companies $3.8 billion annually. Cabling and other physical-network problems account for half that cost says Walt Dymek, associate analyst of network management systems at Datapro Information Services Group (Delran, NJ), a research and consulting firm. However, most LAN management packages help administrators manage the logical network, not the physical network. On the other hand, packages like
Cable System Manager from Apsylog (Palo Alto, CA, (800) 275-2779), which offer cable management, typically ignore logical-network management. Thus, the best an administrator could do was to have two separate systems: one for logical-network management and one for physical-network management.
The lack of products that integrate physical- and logical-network management translates to lost synergies for network administrators. For example, one of the most time-consuming and repetitive tasks a LAN administrator has to perform is handling user moves, additions, and changes. When a user moves from one desk to another, someone usually has to go to a wiring closet and physically move the wire from one hole to another in a punch-down block. Without a way to associate the physical wire segments and holes in the punch-down block with logical network elements (e.g., the wire to Fred's desk), this task can eat up time.
To make management easier, NHC Communications (Mount Royal, Quebec, Canada, (514) 735-2741
) developed Wireman, a low-cost (prices start at $495) SNMP program that also manages the physical network. With Wireman, a LAN administrator can build a database of network elements and SNMP devices. The database stores inventory, warranty, and service histories for items like faceplates, cable segments, hubs, PCs, and any SNMP device on the network.
The information in the Wireman database can help reduce the time required to perform routine tasks. Using the example of moving a person to a new desk, information in Wireman's database can indicate which hub port, wire segment, and faceplate are associated with the person's new location. The program can also send an SNMP command to the hub to activate the new port.
More time can be saved if Wireman is used with NHC's SwitchEx and ShareIt, which are physical switching products. You can ``move'' a user by simply tagging his or her PC on the Windows management screen, dragging the icon of the PC to its new location on a diagram of the network, and dr
opping it into place. Wireman then sends a command to the switching equipment, and the wire connection is made automatically.
Like higher-end management packages, such as Hewlett-Packard's OpenView for Windows, Wireman can act on information from SNMP MIBs (Management Information Bases). For example, you can set thresholds on traffic flow through a hub port and receive alarms when conditions exceed the set value. Integrated Wireman for Windows' price is roughly one-fifth the cost of other PC-based, higher-level management platforms.
Wireman is part of a growing trend to link physical- and logical-network management. For example, Isicad (Anaheim, CA, (714) 533-8910), developer of Command, a physical-network management system, and NetLabs (Los Altos, CA, (415) 961-9500), which sells Asset Manager, a network asset management program, say they will integrate their products in 1995.
Illustration: With NHC's Wireman and switching hardware, you can accomplish many physical-network managemen
t tasks from your PC instead of sending a technician to the wire closet.
Network Management Gets Physical
