The Essential Series: Network Troubleshooting and Problem Identification

The Essentials Series
Network
Troubleshooting and
Problem Identification
sponsored by
by Greg Shields
Article 1: Bandwidth Monitoring and Traffic Analysis ...................................................................1 
Different Perspectives for Different Needs ..........................................................................1 
Flow Analysis Provides a Big Picture View ........................................................................3 
Finding Resolutions to Common Problems .........................................................................4 
Focusing on the Right Features ................................................................................5 
Looking Forward .................................................................................................................5 
Article 2: Isolating Network vs. Application Problems ...................................................................6 
Common Problems in IT ......................................................................................................6 
Common Ways to "Tell the Difference" .............................................................................7 
Network Device Metrics Collection ........................................................................7 
Server Metrics Collection ........................................................................................8 
Application Status and Event Collection .................................................................8 
Transaction Timing Measurements ..........................................................................8 
Alerting and Notification .........................................................................................9 
Auto-Remediation ....................................................................................................9 
Isolating Problems Requires the Work of All IT Teams .....................................................9 
Article 3: Automating the Top 5 Network Tasks with Configuration Management .....................10 
Configuration Management's Top 5 Tasks........................................................................11 
Config Backups ......................................................................................................11 
Change Documentation and Audit Trails ..............................................................12 
Implementing Mass Changes .................................................................................12 
Identifying Inappropriate Configurations ..............................................................13 
Network Problem Notification and Remediation ..................................................13 
From Highly Manual to Highly Automated.......................................................................13 
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