Manageengine Network Configuration Manager

Manageengine Network Configuration Manager – Network Configuration Management (NCM) is a process that every device in the network undergoes throughout its life cycle. It embraces device discovery, inventory maintenance, configuration backup, configuration change monitoring and compliance, user activity tracking, and troubleshooting , and perform appropriate network operations whenever necessary. Network Configuration Management (NCM) becomes a tedious task for administrators if you manage your network environment manually. But if the management of the network configuration can be automated according to its needs and specifications, it will increase the efficiency of your network infrastructure many times and reduce the management of administrators.

Acting as a network configuration management tool, Network Configuration Manager provides comprehensive network configuration management solutions that help you manage the entire lifecycle of your devices and configurations network. Provides solutions for network configuration, change and compliance management. Network Configuration Manager also helps you with critical network tasks such as automating complex network operations, scheduling backups, tracking user activity, generating of detailed reports, and more.

Manageengine Network Configuration Manager

Let’s look at some of the key functions under Network Configuration Manager (NCM).

Device Configuration Change Management

Finding and adding your device to inventory is the first step in managing your network configuration. It is important to keep records of your network devices and their hardware properties. In addition to improving the network administrator’s visibility into network devices, an informative inventory can help the administrator perform regular audits. The inventory provides a detailed view of device specifications such as serial numbers, interface details, port configurations, and device hardware specifications, which can be useful for compilation of audit reports.

A network operator must always be prepared for a network disaster, and the most basic element of disaster preparedness is to take network backups. An incorrect change or update may cause problems such as network failure or security breach. Such events can be handled immediately under Network Configuration Management (NCM) by overwriting the misconfiguration with a trusted version from backup.

Most organizations take backups manually and save them as flat files. This is not recommended as it increases the chances of being hacked. Remember to always encrypt and save your settings.

It is recommended that you keep a log of your users to easily identify configuration changes. In a network that involves many operators, it is important to avoid any unauthorized change that can bring an adverse output. Although they reduce the chance of something going wrong in the network, they do not completely eliminate the chances of it happening. This is where configuration backups come into play. With Network Configuration Manager, you can upload a trusted version of the configuration, restore the device and ensure business continuity.

Importance Of Network Automation

Network Configuration Manager involves the execution of many network functions, which can sometimes be automated. For example, if you want to change the password of all Cisco routers in a network, applying the change to each device individually is a tedious process. This is where configuration templates commonly called “configlets” come into play. You can implement this functionality centrally on all devices using configlets. They also provide the added benefit of scheduling that does not require the user to be present when the operation is executed.

There are certain industry standards that your network equipment must meet. This is to keep your data safe and keep your business out of harm’s way.

The role of SOCS compliance is primarily to refine financial disclosure and prevent accounting fraud in corporations.

HIPAA compliance mandates the protection of sensitive patient records. Any organization that holds sensitive health information must comply with the HIPAA act.

Best Network Management Software And Tools

2. Network Configuration Manager is a comprehensive Network Change and Configuration Management (NCCM) solution that allows the network administrator to efficiently and easily manage network device configurations. Network Configuration Manager offers multi-vendor network device configuration, continuous monitoring of configuration changes, notification of respective changes, detailed operational audit and processes, verification of device configurations for compliance with defined policies and standards, real-time compliance status reporting, and ease of use. Secure recovery to trusted configurations, automation of configuration tasks, and insightful reporting.

Network Configuration Manager can manage network devices such as switches, routers, firewalls, wireless access points, and integrated access devices from multiple vendors such as Cisco, HP, Nortel, Force10, D-Link, Juniper, NetScreen, Juniper, NETGEAR, Dell, and more. 3Com, Foundry, Fortinet, ADTRAN, Enterasys, Huawei, Extreme, Proxim, Aruba, Blue Coat. Discover network devices, build an inventory database and allow IT administrators to configure devices from a central console. A web-based administrator console provides a user interface to perform all configuration functions. In addition, it can be accessed from anywhere with any standard web browser.

Network Configuration Manager will establish an SSH/Telnet connection using the IP address and credentials provided. After that, commands like “show running-config” are executed on the device to obtain the configuration. If the TFTP/SCP protocol is used, the configuration is pushed to the TFTP/SCP server after establishing a connection with the device. Later, after encryption it will be downloaded into our database.