STEELCENTRAL NETCOLLECTOR

Network Discovery Drives IT Infrastructure Management

The speed and reliability of the interaction between end users and an application requires a complete view of the applications from an architecture that looks across all critical parts of the application delivery path. Understanding the network infrastructure requires a network performance architecture that provides the real-time network data management of the underlying IT infrastructure and network contributing to the overall network and application performance.

SteelCentral NetCollector is a network data management solution that acts as a central network analysis topology, traffic, configuration and events data repository and event integration engine for Riverbed SteelCentral IT Infrastructure Management (ITIM) solutions.

How It Works

NetCollector is the central data repository for NetAuditor and NetPlanner, as well as their add-on modules.  

NetCollector performs a multi-vendor, deep network discovery and collection at Layer 2 and Layer 3 for configuration and operational data from the network using CLI and SNMP, then interprets the collected data to infer physical, logical and virtual relationships between network devices.

Features and Benefits of SteelCentral NetCollector

NetCollector has industry-leading multi-vendor deep network discovery and collection at Layer 2 and Layer 3, is built on a real-time network  data model that infers physical, logical and virtual relationships between network elements for a clearer picture of how the network elements work together, their dependencies  and interactions. Key features and benefits includes:

• Leverages all available sources of data to support multiple use cases 
• Comprehensive L2/L3 network discovery and topology creation
• Out-of-the-box support for routers, switches, firewalls, load balancers and hosts

In addition to being a data repository, SteelCentral NetCollector is the mediator for the SteelCentral NetAuditor and SteelCentral NetPlanner suite providing data at multiple timescales:

• Scheduled and on-demand
• Polling at regular intervals
• Event triggered
• Workflow-initiated in real-time

Business case for SteelCentral NetCollector

• Improve IT efficiencies by reducing time and effort for collecting and reconciling data from multiple sources
• Faster troubleshooting workflows results in improveing MTTR with a quicker resolution of unplanned network and application outages
• Ability to run what-if scenarios to accurately plan for changes such as data/network growth, data center migration, technology migration and new applications.