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Note: Because they are simple browser pop-up windows, multiple Device Viewers can be open simultaneously.
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To view different kinds of information in the Device Viewer: Click the desired item in the right-side panel. Corresponding information appears in the main panel. Information in the Device Viewer depends on the device type.
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Note: You can define individual devices' SNMP and CLI credentials in the Device Viewer. For more information, see Adding and Testing SNMP Credentials for a Device and Adding and Testing CLI Credentials for a Device.
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All devices discovered by NetMRI can be inspected using the Device Viewer, including LAN switches, routers of any type, security infrastructure, servers and virtual devices hosted by selected Cisco and Juniper systems.
When NetMRI successfully accesses a network device by SNMP, the top portion of the main Device Viewer panel shows the following information:
- Network View: listed at the end of the header identifying the device.
- Device Type: As detected by the appliance;
- O/S Version: The network operating system as reported by the device;
- Up Time: Time since device was last booted;
- Last Communication: Date and time that NetMRI last communicated with the device, by any protocol;
- Vendor and Model: The vendor and product name/model of the device;
- SNMP Status: Indicates the state of local SNMP collection for this device. Enabled = NetMRI collects SNMP data from the device (see Defining Group Data Collection Settings for instructions on enabling and disabling SNMP data collection);
- MAC Address: The MAC ID of the device.
- Discovery Blackout: Shows whether the device is currently in a discovery blackout. Three possible values appear here: N/A indicates that no blackout is scheduled for the current device; In Effect indicates that the device is currently in a discovery blackout period; and Scheduled indicates that a discovery blackout is scheduled for the current device but is not currently in a blackout, and operations may be performed on it;
- Change Blackout: Shows whether the device is currently in a change blackout. Three possible values appear here: N/A indicates that no blackout is scheduled for the current device; In Effect indicates that the device is currently in a change blackout period; and Scheduled indicates that a change blackout is scheduled for the current device but is not currently in a change blackout, and operations may be performed on it.
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All Device Viewer windows provide a special Device Actions icon at the top. Click this icon for a menu offering useful tools for viewing related information about the chosen device.
Tools
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– Run Ping/Traceroute, SNMP Walk, Cisco C
ommand (where appropriate) or run Discovery Diagnostic against the selected device; Anchor bookmark427 bookmark427
Topology Viewer
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– Display the topology in which the selected device resides; based
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The Device Viewer organizes information about the currently displayed device in the following sections of its accordion menu (some of these sections may only appear for certain device types):
- The Network Analysis section provides ;
- The Device/Network Explorer section provides networking information associated with the current device, including Device Identification, Device Location, Component Inventory, Open Services, CDP Neighbors, L2/L3 neighboring interfaces (Neighbors), Custom Data, LLDP neighbors and Device History, which lists the Discovery history for the device;
- Interfaces: provides configuration information, the address table and performance statistics;
- Router: provides router-specific information;
- Switch: provides switch-specific information;
- Settings & Status section: displays device general settings, management status, SNMP credentials, CLI credentials, configuration file collection settings, logs and device support information;
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Note: To check the license status of any device (whether the device shown in the Device Viewer counts against the license limits for the NetMRI appliance), go to the Device Support page (Device Viewer –> Settings & Status – > Device Support).
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Changes
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Note: You can define individual devices' SNMP and CLI credentials in the Device Viewer. For more information, see
Adding and Testing SNMP Credentials for a Device and Adding and Testing CLI Credentials for a Device.
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The Device Viewer's Issues page (Device Viewer –> Network Analysis –> Issues) lists issues associated with the selected device in the network.
The Detected Changes chart provides an adjustable view of Issue trends for the current device. The time period resides on the horizontal X axis, and the measurement, in number of issues, is on the vertical Y axis. Click the Time Selector drop-down menu to change the X-axis time period for the Historic chart.
The Detected Changes chart displays up to four data sets: Adds, indicating the quantity of new Issues for each time period, Same, indicating Issues the time period that remain from the preceding time period; Cleared, indicating Issues that have been cleared from the system due to administrative remediation or other causes; and Suppressed, which shows the relative quantity of Issues that have been suppressed due to admin configuration of Issues that may be deemed to produce excessive notifications in each time period. Issue counts for each time increment appear as stacked bars in the chart. Move the mouse over any colored bar section to view the count for that Issue type.
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- Click the Display Mode button (above the column headers).
- In the submenu, click the activity type you want to see in the table. Choices are:
All displays all issues that existed during the selected time period. This is an important view for real-time analysis because if an issue existed at one point in the day, but was later automatically cleared by NetMRI, it will only be listed by selecting All.
Active (Default) displays all currently active issues for the selected time period. Current displays all issues present at the end of each day for the selected time period.
Dropped displays all issues that were resolved during the selected time period, and that weren't open at the end of that period.
Suppressed displays all issues you have chosen to suppress.
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The Policy Compliance page (Device Viewer –> Network Analysis –> Policy Compliance) lists policies run against the device, and the outcomes of those policies. If no policies execute against the device during the time period set by the Date/Period drop-down menu in the Policy Compliance title bar, the page is blank.
Also see Policy Design Center for more information on NetMRI's Policy Compliance feature set.
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The Device Viewer's Device/Network Explorer section (Device Viewer –> Device/Network Explorer) shows a substantial body of critical information about a selected device relative to other network elements. Device/Network Explorer conveys many details about the relative location of the device in the network, and aspects of its operating state. The "location" of the device is described by its SNMP identity, with many other pieces of information about the network switch, router, or other entity.
Before device identification, NetMRI verifies SNMP, Telnet and SSH ports by access to these ports during normal operation. Any device that supports the tcpConnState SNMP table and is accessible are polled for additional open TCP ports.
Active port scanning can be enabled at the Settings icon –> Setup –> Collection and Groups –> Global tab.
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Note: Additional information can be displayed using the Columns option available via column header menus.
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To enter new custom data for the device currently shown in the Device Viewer:
- Click New. The Add new custom field data dialog appears.
- Open the Name field and select a field by name.
- Enter a corresponding Value.
- Click Save & Close.
To edit custom data:
- Click the Edit button for the field.
- Change the data value.
- Click the Save & Close button.
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The Identification page (Device Viewer –> Device/Network Explorer –> Device Identification) displays identification information—gathered from a variety of collectors—for the device currently displayed in the Device Viewer. This page lists the identification discovery sources used to determine the device (normally SNMP), a listing of the discovered SNMP Data, and the operating system. Identification information is used to initially determine the type of device being accessed. Because identification information from different sources (listed in the Identification Discovery Sources table) is sometimes conflicting or incorrect, it is possible that a device type or name will initially be incorrect. Over time, as more detailed data is gathered from the device, the device type and/or name are corrected.
The SNMP Data table lists SNMP and OS information, if available, about the device.
The O/S History table lists all the OS versions discovered by NetMRI over time, for the specific device.
Checking Device Locations
The Device Location page (Device Viewer –> Device/Network Explorer –> Device Location) shows the location of a selected device relative to other network elements. Connectivity information is listed across Switchport, Subnet, Network Views and VLAN tabs. Device Location shows all switch ports adjacent to the selected device where applicable, the subnetworks to which the device connects (in the Subnets tab) and VLANs (in the VLANs tab) containing the device.
In the Network Views tab, the device’s local interfaces are listed with their respective Network View membership and their VRF Network Name if applicable to the device.
Viewing Component Inventory
The Component Inventory page (Device Viewer –> Device/Network Explorer –> Component Inventory) lists all hardware information for the device, if SNMP data is available. Specific data depends on the vendor platform, and may include hardware revision, firmware revision, model number and serial number. The page lists all installed interfaces and the chassis for the device. The chassis listing also provides the network device’s serial number and model number. Additional information can be displayed using the Columns option available via column header menus.
Viewing Open Services on a Device
The Open Services page (Device Viewer –> Device/Network Explorer –> Open Services) lists all TCP and UDP ports that are currently open on the device. This feature not only gives you a picture of what the selected device is doing–it can also give you a quick view of possible security holes in the device’s basic configuration. Based on the device type, NetMRI will expect certain services to be configured on the device, and those values will appear in the Expected Service column as the protocol name. Devices will often show services such as telnet, BootP, or SNMP as a service. Services that are detected as being actively used on the device appear in the Verified Service column.
Should a Listen Address value appear as 0.0.0.0, it indicates that the service is configured to run on all ports on the device.
Many devices that operate as switches or routers will not run any additional services, and will show no records on this page.
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Many device vendors do not support CDP; in those cases, they usually support the IEEE standard Link-Layer Discovery Protocol.
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The Custom Data page (Device Viewer –> Device/Network Explorer –> Custom Data) displays any configured custom data fields that are used to provide additional information for user visibility in the Device Viewer. Custom data fields are represented by new columns that can be selected for display in a table.
Custom data also appears in tables available in the Network Explorer –> Inventory page. Define custom data in the Settings icon –> General Settings –> Custom Fields page.
See Defining and Using Custom Fields and Verifying Field Content In Device Viewer & Interface Viewer for more information on the use of custom fields in the Device Viewer.
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Other fields can be selected for appearance in the table.
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Note: The Switch Port Management feature set makes heavy use of the Interface Viewer for checking interface configurations and status. The information in the Device Viewer –> Interfaces page, discussed in this section, is only a subset of the information available in the Interface Viewer.
The Interfaces section (Device Viewer –> Interfaces) provides a survey of key discovered data for all interfaces of the chosen networking device. Each interface link in the table provides a shortcut menu with several useful port management features:
Interface Viewer–Opens an Interface Viewer window for the selected port; Interface LIve Viewer–Opens the Interface Live Viewer for the selected port;
Set Admin Status–Allows the NetMRI user, if they have the correct privileges, to set the chosen port to administratively Up or administratively Down without requiring a command-line connection to do so;
Edit Description–Edit the interface description field of the chosen interface in the table;
Edit VLAN Membership
–Change the VLAN assignment for the chosen port, without requiring an SSH or Telnet connection to the device. Anchor bookmark447 bookmark447
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The Router section (Device Viewer –> Router section) provides protocol and connectivity information for the router or switch/router currently displayed in the Device Viewer, including the complete routing table, information on any dynamic routing protocols the device is running, ARP (IPv4) and Neighbor Discovery records (IPv6). All tables in this category apply for devices supporting both IPv4 and IPv6.
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- Neighbor Name–The discovered name of the OSPF neighbor router;
- Neighbor IP Address–The IP address of the adjacent neighboring interface;
- Network View–Lists the NetMRI network view associated to the device's interface that connects to its discovered OSPF neighbor. Clicking the link opens the Network View Viewer window, which lists the Associated VRFs and the Imported VRFs for the network view.
- Neighbor Router ID–The configured Router ID for the neighboring OSPF router (different value from the neighboring interface);
- Neighbor State–In a functioning OSPF adjacency, this value will show as Full.
Anchor Viewing a Device’s BGP Configuration Viewing a Device’s BGP Configuration
Viewing a Device's BGP ConfigurationThe BGP page lists the basic characteristics for routers in which Border Gateway Protocol is active. The table displays information about all known BGP4 neighbors for the current device. IPv4 and IPv6 versions of BGP are supported. If the router does not support BGP, this page will remain blank. AnyAnchor bookmark464 bookmark464
neighbor interfaces that have established adjacencies with the currently selected router will appear in this table.Anchor bookmark465 bookmark465
The BGP Neighbor Table displays the following information by default (other fields can be added to the table): Local Addr–Local IP address of the individual ports of the current device;
Network View–Lists the NetMRI network view associated to the device's interface that connects to its discovered BGP neighbor. Clicking the link opens the Network View Viewer window, which lists the Associated VRFs and the Imported VRFs for the network view.
Local Port–The Interface ID; Neighbor Addr–The neighboring interface running BGP4, that has established an adjacency with the listed local port; Neighbor Port–The neighboring port's interface ID;
Neighbor AS–The Autonomous System (AS) to which the neighboring interface belongs; Neighbor Name–The name of the router host for the neighboring interface;
RP Peer Device Type–Route Processor peer device type (if applicable), indicates the peer route processor type if line card-based forwarding table synchronization is supported. Possible values include RSP for a Cisco 7500-class router and GRP (gigabit router processor) in a Cisco 12000-class router line card;
Connection State–Reflects the current BGP connection state of the BGP peer when the network was last polled by NetMRI. Typically, the state of a full BGP peer is Established. Seeing anything but an Established state in this field may indicate issues. Other possible states include Idle, Connect, Active, OpenSent, and OpenConfirm. BGP sessions begin in an Idle state when the device initializes the resource it needs for the upcoming session. It then transitions to state Connect while the peers establish their TCP connection for BGP. Once the TCP connection is established between the peer interfaces the routing protocol moves to the OpenSent state. (If the TCP connection fails, the peers enter the Active state.) OpenSent indicates that the device has received an Open message from the peer, and then determines the AS to which the neighbor belongs. OpenConfirm indicates that the device is wait
ing for a Keepalive response from the other end. If it gets one, the BGP connection switches to the Established state.Anchor bookmark466 bookmark466
Last State Change–The timestamp for the last detected occasion that the current device changed its BGP state on the current interface in the table.Anchor Viewing a Device’s Hot-Standby Routing P Viewing a Device’s Hot-Standby Routing P
Viewing a Device's Hot-Standby Routing Protocol (HSRP) StatusThe HSRP page lists the characteristics for all Cisco routers supporting the Hot Standby Routing Protocol and Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol, which are typically used for Cisco VPN concentrators. Tables in this page list all HSRP groups supported by the device, and additional details for each group.Anchor bookmark467 bookmark467 Anchor Viewing a Device’s Quality of Service St Viewing a Device’s Quality of Service St
Viewing a Device's Quality of Service Status and SettingsNetMRI performs data collection and analysis of router operational data that proAnchor bookmark468 bookmark468
vide visibility into the operation of Quality of Service (QoS) classification and routing of network traffic. The Cisco Class-Based Quality of Service (CBQos) functionality is typically used to identify and rank packets according to their importance to the organization and queue them in a way that guarantees a specific quality of service as packets transit the network.Anchor bookmark469 bookmark469
The QoS page and its tables apply only to QoS information for Cisco routers, displaying the number of packets and drops per Quality of Service queue during the time period (above the table) selected for the page. The QoS page divides into three tabs:
QoS Table–Shows the broad picture of QoS operation in the chosen device.
QoS Daily Table–Daily performance records of the current router's QoS configuration. Raw QoS Data–Raw packet counts for each of the queues for the currently selected router.
Proper QoS operation depends on two factors. First, configuration must be done correctly across many devices. Any difference in configuration may result in packets not being properly queued, resulting in high latency, jitter or packet loss, particularly on congested links.
The second factor involves monitoring the operational characteristics of QoS. Operational characteristics include elements such as packet volume per queue and packet drops per queue. These are reflected in the QoS Table and QoS Daily Table. The operational data can indicate network misconfigurations and data flow changes that no longer match assumptions made during the network's design.Anchor QoS Analysis QoS Analysis
QoS AnalysisNetMRI automatically identifies routers configured with QoS and collects operational data on each configured queue. There are no configuration options within NetMRI that affect identification of queues and collection of operational data. The analysis identifies operational signatures of potential problems such as oversubscribed interfaces.Anchor bookmark470 bookmark470 Anchor QoS Queue Dropped Packets QoS Queue Dropped Packets
QoS Queue Dropped PacketsAny QoS queue that is dropping packets is identified. The relative priority of the queue determines the severity level of the issue that is generated in the Issue List. The table below shows the severity generated for each queue's Per-Hop Behavior (PHB) and DSCP value that are commonly associated with applications. Drops in high priority queues will generate Error issues, while medium priority queues generate Warning issues. The lowest priority queues, including the scavenger queue, generate Info issues.Anchor bookmark471 bookmark471 |?|Classification| | | |
Application
PHB
DSCP I
ssue Severity
Link Layer keepalives
CS7
56 Error
Routing
CS6
48 Error
Voice
EF
46 Error
CS5
40 Error
AF43
38I
nfo
AF42
36 Warning
Interactive Video
AF41
34 Error
Streaming Video
CS4
32 Error
AF33
30I
nfo
AF32
28 Warning
Mission Critical
AF31
26 Error
Call Signaling
CS3
24 Error
AF23
22I
nfo
AF22
20I
nfo
Transactional Data
AF21
18 Warning
Network Management
CS2
16 Warning
AF13
14I
nfo
AF12
12I
nfo
Bulk Data
AF11
10I
nfo
Scavenger
CS1
8I
nfo
Best Effort
0
0 I
nfo
?
When a high priority queue drops packets, it indicates that insufficient bandwidth may be allocated to that queue. Sometimes this occurs because the queue definition is based on network traffic volume assumptions that no longer apply. For example, a queue configured to handle four simultaneous voice calls may be dropping packets because more than four simultaneous calls are being handled.
Conversely, when many (or all) queues are dropping packets, the entire link may be oversubscribed and the only valid remediation is to add more bandwidth. In this scenario, the high priority queues use nearly all the bandwidth and will still drop packets because the offered load is greater than the available bandwidth. Because there is little remaining bandwidth, low priority queues will also drop packets.
When a QoS queue drop is detected during the analysis of the collected data, an issue appears on the issue list. Clicking on the issue hyperlink opens the issue in the Issue Viewer, where information is displayed about each queue that experienced the drops. The Issue Viewer provides several hyperlinks to access related information.
- To open the Device Viewer: Click a hyperlink in the IP Address column.
- To open the Interface Viewer: Click a hyperlink in the Interface column.
- To open the Quality of Service Viewer: Click a hyperlink in the Policy Name column.
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NetMRI divides Ethernet switch information into a separate Switch section (Device Viewer –> Switch) to provide discrete information for the switch currently shown in the Device Viewer.
The Switch pages provide a substantial amount of information, divided into five categories: VLAN, VLAN Trunks, VLAN Changes, Port Config and Forwarding. Consult the topics below for more information.
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The device viewer's VLANs page (Device Viewer –> Switch –> VLANs) provides a summary table for all of the VLANs provisioned in the selected switch.
The Active VLANs (Device Viewer –> Switch –> VLANs –> Active VLANs) table provides some important information for checking the switch's VLAN configuration and its status in the network.
The Active VLANs table lists all VLANs being supported by the device, including the root bridge for each VLAN and elements such as the Root Priority, Switch Priority, Root Cost, and the Spanning Tree Protocol. Root Bridge Priority values are used in the election process of a root bridge for a particular VLAN.
A root bridge is selected by setting a switch's root priority value to a lower value in comparison to other switches. The root bridge priority value defaults to 32768 for most platforms and the maximum value is 65535; the minimum value is 0. The bridge priority value is combined with the MAC address ID for the switch to determine the spanning-tree root bridge for the network. This resulting value propagates through the switched network in Bridge Protocol Data Units (BPDUs) from the root bridge, to ensure that the devices in the switched network agree on the identity of the root bridge.
Should all switches in the network retain the same value, an election takes place in which the switch with the lowest MAC address becomes the root bridge. Many older Ethernet switches may have lower Ethernet MAC address values and may thus be automatically elected as the root bridge for many VLANS in the network, even though the switch will not have the processing or memory to handle the load. To ensure the 'correct' switch is elected as the root, the best practice is to set the desired core switch's bridge priority to a relatively low value such as 8000; then, a second root bridge is chosen as a backup root and its priority set to a slightly higher value.
Listed in the Active VLANs page, the switch priority of a VLAN is the value defined in the local switches' configuration as the candidate value for election as the root.
The root cost value in the table is the cumulative cost of all links in the current VLAN leading to the root bridge. VLANIDs that show a value of 0 are not participating in the spanning tree.
The Spanning Tree Protocol column reports the version of the spanning tree protocol being run on each switch interface. A normal value for this column is ieee8021d.
Note: For Cisco devices, the root switch on the spanning tree network may be found by entering a show spanning-tree command on the switches participating in each VLAN. You can use the Open Telnet Session or Open SSH Session features in NetMRI to connect to managed devices.
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The VLAN Configuration table (Device Viewer –> Switch –> VLANs –> VLAN Configuration) lists configuration information for each VLAN supported by the device. Configuration settings for each VLAN include the three key STP timers Hello Time, Max Age and Fwd Delay for both the local bridge (on each VLAN, these are called Current values) and its root bridge (called Bridge values). For the current switch's VLANs, the Current Hello Time shows the time intervals between the transmission of configuration bridge PDUs (BPDUs), which flow outward from the root bridge as notifications of its root status to the other switches in the spanning tree.
The Current Max Age is the time period that an installed root's BPDU is stored by the selected switch. (The Cisco default value is 20 seconds.) The Current Fwd Delay value is the time period, in seconds that the current device spends in the Listening and Learning states. Among other things, it indicates how long the bridging table ages before the device switches from Forwarding mode to Listening mode. Fwd Delay also affects how quickly the switch responds to a change in topology.
The Bridge Hello Time, Bridge Max Age and Bridge Fwd Delay values are the corresponding values dictated by the root bridge through its BPDUs to all the other bridges in the switched network, including to the current device. Most deployments require careful consideration before changing spanning tree protocol timing values, and such values should normally be modified only at the root bridge.
The figure above illustrates the principles. The root bridge advertises its Bridge Max Age = 2000, Bridge Hello Time
= 200, and Bridge Fwd Delay = 1500 in the BPDUs it sends to the other switches in the network through VLAN 60. Those values are in turn used by the other switches in the network to configure their respective Max Age, Hello Time and Fwd Delay settings (all labeled as Current in the table). In the current switch, those three STP timer values are set to the same values because they are determined by the three values communicated through the root bridge BPDUs.
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The VLAN Trunking Protocol (VTP) is a Cisco-proprietary method for communicating VLAN information across switch ports between Catalyst switches. Other solutions to the same problem include the non-proprietary 802.1Q. NetMRI supports and reports upon both varieties of VLAN trunking depending upon the switch vendor.
The VLAN Trunks page (Device Viewer –> Switch –> VLAN Trunks) presents all ports on the current switch that have 802.1Q or VTP configured in some way, whether the protocol in operation or is simply enabled. The complete list of interfaces in the current switch device appears, showing both the Dynamic State (on, off or auto) and the Dynamic Status of each port (trunking or notTrunking). Should a port be set as a VLAN trunk, its Dynamic Status will show trunking. The VLAN Trunks page also lists links for each Peer switch and Peer Interface.
Clicking the link for the trunking interface in the VLAN Trunks list displays the Interface Viewer. Its VLAN Name listing appears as TRUNKING, along with the peer switch name, the neighbor MAC address (not the MAC for the neighboring interface), and the neighboring port ID.
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The Port Config page (Device Viewer –> Switch –> Port Config) lists all the ports on the chosen switch, the VLAN provisioned for each port, and basic information such as the port state, the Port Fast state, and the administrative and operational state of each switch port (Up or Down). Non-normal data appears in red. The port state can show one of five different values: forwarding, in which the port is sending and receiving user data; learning, in which the switch is building the bridging table; listening, in which the switch port is sending and receiving bridging PDUs in an effort to determine the active switching topology; blocking, where the port is only allowed to receive bridging PDUs but otherwise passes no user traffic; and disabled, in which the port is administratively down.
In a stable spanning tree network, only Blocking and Forwarding states will typically be seen. The Forwarding state is the only state in which the switch port transmits user data PDUs
The Interface column provides links to the Interface viewer for every switch port. The VLAN ID and VLAN Name columns column provides links to the VLAN viewer, in which you see the list of devices participating in the VLAN.
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The Wireless section (Device Viewer –> Wireless section) prov
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The Management Status page (Device Viewer –> Settings & Status –> Management Status) displays the same visual indicators as shown for the device in the Network Explorer –> Discovery page. Each discovery indicator shows a related status message.
Device credentials are a critical element in ensuring a device can be managed. You can add SNMP and CLI credentials to any individual discovered device. For more information, see Adding and Testing SNMP Credentials for a Device and Adding and Testing CLI Credentials for a Device.
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You manage data collection settings through Device Group configuration (see Creating Device Groups for information about group settings for data collection). For example, a simple Cisco router does not support VLANs, and its listing shows No under the Supported column, and a Last Collected: Never message in the Value column. In this case, NetMRI will not attempt to collect VLAN data as the device is not classified as a Switch. When NetMRI encounters a device that it classifies as a Switch but hasn't previously supported, the system will attempt VLAN data collection from the device. The Supported column will reflect No but the Last Collected value may reflect that data collection was possible.
Device credentials are a critical element in ensuring management for a device. You can add SNMP and CLI credentials to any individual discovered device. For more information, see Adding and Testing SNMP Credentials for a Device and Adding and Testing CLI Credentials for a Device.