Glossary

ARP Cache (Address Resolution Protocol Cache)

ARP is a protocol for mapping an IP address to a physical machine address (such as a MAC Address). An ARP Cache is used to maintain the correlation between IP Addresses and machine addresses. porttracker uses Arp Caches obtained from routers and switches to determine MAC Address to IP Address mappings.

Available Ports (Switch View)

The 'Available Ports' Column in switch view is calculated using the number of 'free ports' that have not had a device connected to them for at least the period defined in the 'Port Unused Period'.

CDP (Cisco Discovery Protocol)

CDP is a Cisco proprietary network protocol used to discover information about other directly connected network devices (such as Operating System & IP Address). CDP is an independent network layer protocol not requiring the use of IP. porttracker uses CDP during the Discover process to locate Switches and Routers.

CMDB (Configuration management database)

A configuration management database (CMDB) is a database that contains all relevant information about the components of the information system used in an organization's IT services and the relationships between those components. A CMDB provides an organized view of data and a means of examining that data from any desired perspective.

Device View

porttracker implements different ways of viewing data. In this view each End Device is displayed along with information about the switch ports they were discovered on. In Device View each end device is represented by a unique row of data.

Discovery (Discover)

This is the process porttracker uses to locate infrastructure devices on your network. Infrastructure devices can be either Switches or Routers. From a single address porttracker builds a list of switches in the realm, which are then assigned to a poller.

Discovery Realm (DR)

porttracker maps parts of your network to Discovery Realms. Data obtained through Discovery and Poll in one Discovery Realm is completely separate from other Discovery Realms. porttracker allows you to discover overlapping address ranges using Realm definitions (network/mask). Realms are useful way of seperating different parts of your network for reporting purposes. A service provider might, for example, use a different realm for each customer while an enterprise user might keep internal and DMZ devices in different realms.

Device (End Device)

An end device that porttracker found port, DNS and IP address information for, end devices can be PC's, servers, IP Phones or wireless devices. An End Device is represented as a unique row in a Device View

Filters

Filters can be applied within device / switch view to narrow down a search allowing the user to monitor their network in a quick and efficient manner. Filters can be applied in combinations and will remain in effect until the filter field is deleted.

Free Ports (Switch View)

Free Ports are interfaces that have not been seen to have had a MAC address by porttracker during any of the polls, for the period specified.

IPAM (Internet Protocol Address Management)

Internet Protocol Address Management is a means of planning, tracking, and managing the Internet Protocol address space used in a network. Most commonly, tools such as DNS and DHCP are used in tandem to perform this task.

MAC Address (Media Access Control Address)

MAC Addresses are hardware addresses that uniquely identify devices on a network. They are 6 bytes in length (48 bits) and are normally written as 6 pairs of hexadecimal numbers separated by dashes or colons (e.g. fe:00:fc:c0:34:03).

Master Appliance

This is the appliance hosting the porttracker SecureWeb Interface where the product is administered, controlled and data viewed. It also hosts the porttracker daemon which controls the Discover and Poll process across all Poller Appliances and itself. Each porttracker implementation must contain at least one master appliance.

Poller Appliance

Acting as a slave to a Master Appliance, a poller appliance receives instruction from the master via a secure socket to poll the switches that have been assigned to it. Poller Appliances are used in a distributed environment to spread load, increase performance and work in environments with more than one Realm.

Polling (Poll)

This is the process that porttracker uses to poll infrastructure devices for Device information. polling can be performed by either a Master Appliance (for standalone operation), or additional Poller Appliances. The number of switches and ports a single poller can work with is dependent on the many factors including SNMP versions supported, network latency and timeouts.

qsync (porttracker VitalQIP Synchronization Module)

porttracker allows the use of different sync modules pulling data out of porttracker and inserting into or synchronizing with other products. The porttracker VitalQIP Synchronization Module updates VitalQIP with data discovered by porttracker. Data is attached to IP objects in form of User Defined Fields (UDFs).

Router

A Router is a piece of hardware or software that connects two or more networks at Layer 3. porttracker discovers routing information from routers to determine other candidate switches and routers for Discovery, as well as Arp Cache information.

SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol)

SNMP is a TCP/IP application layer protocol that facilitates the exchange of management information between network devices. porttracker uses SNMP v2c to query switches and routers in both the Discovery and Polling phases. porttracker currently requires Read Only Access to the SNMP community on a switch or router as it makes no changes to it.

SNMP Credentials

Network devices implementing the SNMP typically allow configuration of read and write access control. A SNMP credential is a text string which one network device can use to gain read or write access to another network device. porttracker uses SNMP Credentials to limit the area of discovery on your network for particular Discovery Realms. porttracker currently requires Read Only Access to the SNMP community on a switch or router as it makes no changes to it.

Switch

A Switch is a network device that filters, forwards and floods frames based on the destination address of each frame. porttracker discovers port information from switches as well as bridge forwarding tables to determine where an End Device is connected. Porttracker will work with both Layer-2 and Layer-3 switches.

Switch Summary View (Switch View)

porttracker implements different ways of viewing data. In this view a summary of switch port cacpacity displayed. The user can drill down to a Switch Detail View and view the status of each port.

Switch Detail View

Switch Detail View displays a row of data for each interface or connector present in the device. switch detail view also displays the type of device that is attached to each interface (End Device, Infrastructure Device, IPPhone etc)

Sync module

porttracker allows the use of different sync modules pulling data out of porttracker and inserting into or synchronising with other products. An example of this is the porttracker VitalQIP Synchronisation Module (qsync) .

Topology

In porttracker this word refers to the logical topology of network devices. During Discovery and Polling porttracker attempts to work out what network devices are connected to each other at Layer-2.

View

In porttracker a view consists of an association of one or more columns, the filters applied to then as well as the sort order. The View can then be saved much like bookmark and later selected from the top level menu or scheduled as a report.