Automated Network Graphing Tool

A network graphing tool allows you to visualize your network and how it’s configured. To ensure a proper understanding of your IT inventory, graphing helps you keep track of an evolving, shifting inventory of network devices.

Before we discuss the functions of network graphing software, it’s important to understand the purpose of a network graph. Network graphs provide a visual display of the devices in your network, and how they’re interconnected. Network graphs (also known as diagrams or maps) offer insight into the location, performance, and purpose of IP-connected devices—both physical and virtual. These devices are the nodes of your network graph.

Once you have identified the nodes of your network graph, you can use lines or arrows to demonstrate how these nodes are interconnected. With graphing, you can visualize dependencies and communication between devices for an intuitive understanding of how your network works.

Network graphing tools allow you to digitally visualize your network configuration. In theory, you could make a network map by hand—but it would be a frustrating and time-consuming effort, prone to human error. Instead, network graphing tools offer a digitized solution to mapping on your computer, with drag-and-drop nodes, the ability to zoom in to specific features of your network, and an overview of complex network components from a unified control center.

Manual network graphing doesn’t necessarily mean drawing out a network diagram by hand—in this case, “manual” refers to the process of configuring network graphs based on your own device inventory. Automated network graphing, on the other hand, involves a network graphing tool that can scan your network for nodes, graph nodes in an automated configuration, and display network configuration using an auto-generated understanding of your network topology.

Some network admins advocate for a certain degree of manual graphing, since manual graphs allow you to customize your nodes and connections, and to maintain complete control over your configuration based on your expert understanding. However, manual network graphing is a time-consuming and costly endeavor. For instance, many of today’s networks are nearly impossible to graph using any kind of efficient manual method. Multi-level networks, complex dependencies, and large networks with thousands of nodes will create a headache for anyone trying to configure a manual topology diagram.

Automated network graphing tools provide a solution to the inefficiency of manual mapping. With an automated network scanner, automated graphs can be generated in almost no time at all—without human error. Automated network graphing also allows your network graphs to be much more flexible than a manual graph could ever be. As your network grows, automated graphing tools can continue to scan for new devices and update your graph with new information.

Any network admin who prefers manual graphing for its customization can rest assured intelligent graphing software like SolarWinds NTM offers automated graphs that are as customizable as any manual graph. With filters and search criteria, SolarWinds NTM provides a great deal of visual customization, as well as customized scanning, discovery, and diagnostics based on the unique requirements of your graph.

Network graphing tools can save money, time, and hassle for admins and their clients. Network topology graphs aren’t just a user-friendly way to visualize data—they often provide the key to effective network management. Your network graphing tool can make nearly every aspect of network management more efficient, more cost-effective, and more successful.

One of the major advantages of network graphing is the improved ability to troubleshoot. Network graphs allow you to troubleshoot performance issues by offering a detailed view of devices and how they affect other devices within your network. When you understand dependencies between different devices, the location of new devices, and the OSI layer configuration of your nodes, you can accurately pinpoint the root cause of performance issues. Instead of taking a guess as to which devices may be affecting performance issues, you can gain an accurate understanding of your network’s structure based on intelligent machine learning.

Automated network graphing begins with network scanning and discovery. Your discovery tool can identify devices connected to your network and automatically document details such as IP address, ownership, licensing information, and dependencies. As your network changes, an automated network graphing tool like SolarWinds NTM can rescan your network to accommodate new devices and configurations.

Network discovery in today’s network landscape requires multi-level capabilities. The modern enterprise combines virtual and physical devices within your network setup, with cross-layer dependencies among different nodes. To discover multi-layer devices, your graphing tool cannot use traditional ICMP and SNMP discovery scans—you’ll also need VMware scanning, Microsoft Hyper-V scanning, and other tools to discover devices at higher OSI layers.

Once you have discovered multi-layer network components, network graphing tools can construct digital graphs with detailed insights into your network. Effective graphing tools won’t simply provide one large topology graph—they can allow you to isolate subnets, exclude select nodes, and understand dependencies in a specific region of your network. For example, from your NTM control center, you can create new maps with customized scopes for detailed insight into specific network components.

SolarWinds Network Topology Mapper (NTM) uses the SolarWinds discovery technique to detect and document each new device that enters your network. With multi-layer graphing capability, you can use different scanning protocols to identify different types of devices and understand dependencies across OSI layers. If you wish to scan for especially unusual nodes, you can configure a third-party utility and configure discovery parameters using the node’s hostname, IP address, and/or SNMPv2 community string.

SolarWinds NTM is scalable and adjustable, so you can view new maps using a specific scope. To create a new graph, simply name a new scan and define the scope. You can scan for a specific range of IP addresses or a specific subnet, customize the scan’s hops, and establish other criteria for a graph to make it both uniquely customized and smoothly automated.

With customizable display features, you can view nodes and connections with your preferred icons. Plus, you can export topology graphs to a wide range of third-party mapping tools for industry-specific compliance reports. With SolarWinds Network Topology Mapper, you can maintain full control over your automated network graphing.