Documentation

Cable Management Software is essential for any organisation and is part of a configuration repository.

In theorie: Everything is documented and up to date with a minimum of effort. Everyone who needs acces will have a real time view of the configuration. Projects (that will claim resources) are visible in the system as reserved (space).

In practice: In a large organisation, every local administrator probably will have his own set of documentation (spreadsheets and diagrams).

Lees meer

In this Top 10 Network Mapping Software review we will also focus on the relation with Microsoft Visio. Lets be honest: Creating and maintaining Visio diagrams is really time consuming. Especially in large and complex IT environments.

Scope:

In this article we will focus on the commercial Top 10 network mapping software tools with a main focus on Layer 2 mapping. We exclude Layer 3 mapping for the moment.

Outside scope:

1. There a number of good open source mapping tools available but for this article it is out of scope.
2. Alle monitoring systems that have a very basic integrated mapping facility.

Categories:

There are basically two types of categories:

1. entry level and
2. enterprise level

Kick of with entry level

Most entry level Network Mapping Software relies on a few network discovery mechanisms and will create some very basic network diagrams. There are some problems with these entry level software tools. Just to name a few:

1. If the Network Mapping Software creates Visio Diagrams, they have to be maintained manually.
2. Creating different views of one set of IT components is not possible. E.g. just give me the fiber connections between all the core switch devices.
3. Specific components in a switch or router are difficult to map. E.g. dual or multiple power supplies, specific cards (Fiber Optics, Copper, Gigabit).
4. Network Mapping Software that do more becomes hard to handle, is very expensive and still shows a lot of gaps.
5. Not integrated with cable management and other management systems like data center floor plans.
6. Rich data of IT component (like firmware version, vendor, Status: test /live /development) can’t be added and therefore not made visible.
7. Limited import and export possibilities.

Lees meer