Network Integrity allows you to locate stranded network assets. These are resources that you have, but which don't appear in your inventory. You save capital investment by using all existing resources effectively, rather than obtaining new resources prematurely.

Maintaining an accurate representation of your network means that any service fulfillment activities are more likely to complete successfully, and as designed, without going to fallout, or requiring manual intervention. This means that services are delivered more quickly, and less expensively.

With an accurate view of your network, you can plan and provision new services effectively and efficiently. Network element issues can be pinpointed faster and resolved more efficiently.

Provisioning errors due to incorrectly identified or unavailable network resources are costly to fix and detrimental to customer satisfaction. Network Integrity allows you to determine where the problems are, and what the root cause is. It then allows you to efficiently resolve these issues (which can be an error-prone activity if performed manually).

Network Integrity automates the population of your inventory, reducing potential errors compared to manually discovering and recording this information. This increases efficiency and reduces organizational costs.

A scan is a set of configurations used to perform a Network Integrity operation. Configurations can include discovery operations, constraints on what parts of the network are discovered, and so on.

Network Integrity supports the following types of scans:

• Discovery scan: A discovery scan discovers your network. This can include network elements, physical resources, and logical resources. As part of the scan, you can specify network connection information such as name, port, community string, and time-out values. Network Integrity includes the following discovery scans:

  • Discover Generic SNMP: Scans all types of Generic Vendor Device and models its physical and logical device tree.

  • Discover MIB II SNMP: Discovers MIB II RFC1213, IF MIB RFC1573, IP-MIB for IPv6, and uses IANA MIB for support. Retrieves device information (including name, description, sysObjectId, and mgmtIpAddress) and interface details (including name, description, type, speed, status, alias and more) and uses the information to model the logical tree.

  • Discover TL1: Scans one or more TL1 devices to retrieve device information and interface details, modeling the discovered data in the Information Model.

  • Discover TMF814: Scans both physical (equipment) and logical (interface) hierarchy details of managed elements using the TMF814 CORBA interface as its discovery protocol and models the physical and logical tree.

  • Discover Alcatel 1359IOO RI: Scans one or more Alcatel 1359IOO RI CSV file instances in a directory, resulting in hierarchical physical device model instances.

  • Discover Ericsson XML: Scans one or more XML device file instances, resulting in multiple hierarchical device model instances.

  • Discover WDM Services: Discovers the DWDM entities like Client, OCH, ODUFlex, ODU, OTU, OMS using the TMF814 CORBA interface as its discovery protocol.

  • Discover IMS Network FTP: Discovers devices in IMS network over FTP protocol and models physical and logical hierarchies. This action also models the associations between the physical and logical hierarchies.

  • Discover Optical Devices FTP: Discovers Optical devices over FTP protocol and models physical and logical hierarchies. This action also models the associations between the physical and logical hierarchies.

  • Discover Microwave Devices: Discovers Microwave devices using FTP protocol and models physical and logical hierarchies. This action also models the associations between the physical and logical hierarchies.

  • Discover SDH Connectivity and Service: Discovers SDH entities like Topological links, Trails, Tunnel and Services using FTP protocol. It also assimilates end to end circuit stitching.

  • Discover Generic SNMP Device: Scans a Generic device using SNMP protocol and model discovered data to physical and logical tree.

  For more details about the above discovery scans, refer to their respective cartridge guides.

• Assimilation scan: An assimilation scan produces additional scan results from existing scan results. When configuring an assimilation scan, you can choose additional scans to serve as input to the assimilation scan. Network Integrity includes the following assimilation scan:

  • Assimilate Optical Circuits: Scans optical model input files, tracing and modeling end-to-end circuits.

• Import scan: An import scan imports network data from an inventory system. Network Integrity includes the following import scans:

  • Import MIB II from UIM

  • Import from MSS

  • Import WDM Services

  • Import SDH Connectivity and Service from UIM

  • Incremental Import SDH Connectivity and Service From UIM

  • Import Logical Optical from UIM

  • Import Optical from UIM

  • Incremental Import from UIM

Network Integrity supports the simultaneous processing of multiple scans.

See the appropriate cartridge guide for more information about the above mentioned scans.

Network Integrity uses cartridges to provide support for accessing different types of inventory targets and to specify scan actions for them. A scan typically specifies a scan action and scan action parameters, such as protocol and vendor properties, addresses (scope), and schedules.

You can associate a scan with one or more tags that define or describes the scope of the scan. Tags are customizable, and can relate to geography, ownership, network type, or other references.

Scans support multiple IP address formats, including IPv4, IPv6, wildcards, and ranges. You can enter the IP addresses manually or import them from a file, and multiple IP address specifications can be combined into one scan. For example, you can carry out a discovery scan using a combined IPv4, IPv6, and Domain Name System (DNS) host name configuration.

To search within a scope while editing or creating a Discovery scan:

1. From the Tasks panel, click Manage Scans.

   The Manage Scans page appears.

2. Do one of the following:

   • Click the Create icon on the Search Results table.

     The Create Scan page appears.

   • Select a scan record and click the Edit icon.

     The Edit Scan page appears.

3. Go to the Scope tab.

4. Select an option for Search Scope and enter the corresponding value.

5. Click Search.

   The scan is created or edited according to the scope.

6. (Optional) Enter a value in the text field and click the Add Address icon to add a network address.

7. (Optional) From the Network Address table, select a record and click the Delete Address icon to delete the network address.

The scan schedule determines when a scan runs. You can set a scan to run immediately, regularly, or on-demand. The frequency with which scans repeat is configurable. For example, you can set scans to repeat at monthly intervals, on the last day of the month, or at a set time every night.

A blackout window defines a period of time when a specified scan should not run, or be paused if already running. This can be used to avoid running scans during peak network traffic hours, or during a planned network outage. The scheduling options available for blackout windows are identical to those for scheduling scans.

When a scan runs, the Scan Results table lists the outcomes for one or more Network Integrity scans. Each scan is defined by scan name and by scan action type associated with the scan - discovery, import, or assimilation. In addition, the table identifies the data source assigned to each scan, the current status of the scan (in progress, completed, completed with errors).

The scan results list the date and duration of the scan run and details of errors in the scan. If selected, the summary of detected discrepancies is presented.

All scan data is presented in one place, and filtering and sorting are supported, so you can get to the key data to identify issues. By selecting individual scan result details, you can drill down to entity details, and to individual entity attributes.

Network Integrity integrates with UIM using reference cartridges. The cartridges can be extended to meet the particularities of your UIM deployment. Network Integrity can retrieve inventory information from UIM, and communicate actions back to UIM to resolve discrepancies. The Network Integrity download includes UIM reference cartridges and sample cartridge packs for modeling logical and physical device hierarchies.

Network Integrity and UIM both use Design Studio to design and deploy the cartridges that enable extensibility and integration.

Network Integrity integrates with MSS using reference cartridges. The cartridges can be extended to meet the particularities of your MSS system. Network Integrity can retrieve inventory information from MSS, and communicate actions back to MSS to resolve discrepancies. The Network Integrity download includes one MSS reference cartridge for modeling logical and physical device hierarchies.

Network Integrity uses Design Studio to design and deploy the cartridges that enable extensibility and integration.