Alcatel-Lucent VitalQIP 7.3 Product Description Manual

Brand: Alcatel-Lucent

Model: VitalQIP 7.3

Type: Product Description Manual

VitalQIP

7.3

DNS/DHCP & IP Address Management

Solution

Product Description guide

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

1 Introduction ............................................................................................................ 4

1.1 Scope ........................................................................................................................ 4

1.2 Audience .................................................................................................................. 4

1.3 Introduction to IP Management .............................................................................. 4

1.3.1 Configuring network nodes and IP enabled devices with IP information ................. 5

1.3.2 Monitoring IP address usage ..................................................................................... 5

1.3.3 Configuring host name to IP address lookup facilities ............................................. 6

1.3.4 Auditing and Tracking changes in the IP Address Space ........................................... 7

1.3.5 Establishing policies and rules for utilizing the address space effectively

and efficiency. ..................................................................................................................... 7

1.3.6 What‟s New with the VitalQIP Next Generation Platform? ...................................... 8

1.4 Benefits .................................................................................................................... 9

2 Product Capabilities ............................................................................................ 10

2.1 Core Product .......................................................................................................... 11

2.1.1 User interface ........................................................................................................ 11

2.1.2 Features ................................................................................................................ 12

2.1.3 VitalQIP 7.3 Next Generation Web GUI .................................................................. 14

2.1.4 Flexibility in Supporting Mulit-Vendor Solution...................................................... 18

2.1.5 VitalQIP Appliance Based Solution ......................................................................... 19

2.1.6 Application Programming Interfaces ...................................................................... 20

2.1.7 Database ................................................................................................................ 20

2.1.7.1 Data viewing and filtering capability ..................................................................... 20

2.1.7.2 Data Export/Import capabilities ............................................................................ 21

2.1.8 SNMP Capabilities. ................................................................................................. 21

2.1.9 Reporting Capability .............................................................................................. 21

2.1.10 User Configurable Capability ................................................................................. 22

3 Architecture ......................................................................................................... 23

3.1 Additional Product Features ................................................................................. 34

3.1.1 VitalQIP Audit Manager Module .............................................................................. 34

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3.1.2 VitalQIP Services Manager Module ......................................................................... 35

3.1.3 VitalQIP Access control .......................................................................................... 36

3.1.4 VitalQIP ENUM Manager ......................................................................................... 36

3.1.5 VitalQIP Appliance manager .................................................................................. 37

3.2 Computing platform requirements and options .................................................. 42

3.2.1 Supported Platforms .............................................................................................. 42

3.2.2 High Availability Architecture ................................................................................ 42

4 SyStem performance and reliability .................................................................. 42

5 Operations and administration .......................................................................... 43

5.1 Security .................................................................................................................. 43

5.2 Disaster Recovery .................................................................................................. 44

6 VitalQIP 7.3 new Features .................................................................................. 44

6.1.1 New next generation web based GUI: .................................................................... 44

6.1.2 Global Search Engine ............................................................................................ 45

6.1.3 VisualIP space: ....................................................................................................... 46

6.1.4 Client ID from the GUI: .......................................................................................... 46

7 VitalQIP AM 1.7 Appliance new features ........................................................... 47

7.1.1 Package Deployment Scheduling: .......................................................................... 47

7.1.2 SNMP on the AMS ................................................................................................... 47

7.1.3 QIP DB Import/Export VIA AMS .............................................................................. 47

7.1.4 Multiple Syslog Servers .......................................................................................... 48

8 Implementation, Configuration, and Testing (SoftwAre integration

services) ........................................................................................................................ 48

9 Product Education and Training ......................................................................... 49

10 Future Enhancements .......................................................................................... 49

Appendix I: Acronym glossary ..................................................................................... 49

Appendix II: Availability and Ordering ...................................................................... 50

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1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 Scope

VitalQIP ® is the industry's leading IP management software product. This product description

provides a detailed technical and marketing description of VitalQIP. This includes background

on the basics of IP management; the business needs and value proposition, and an overview of

the product itself, including the latest release 7.3 features. This document should be used

and view in conjunction with the most current release notes “VitalQIP 7.3 Release Notes” as

well as the User Guide.

1.2 Audience

This document is intended for Sales, Marketing, Product Management, Services, Business

Partners and Information Delivery personnel requiring an in-depth description of VitalQIP ®

and its extended capabilities.

1.3 Introduction to IP Management

It can be argued that VitalQIP, or QIP as it was originally named, created the IP management

software market. QIP was first released to the market in 1995 based on a request from J P

Morgan for a software application to manage their IP address space. They required a single

centralized inventory of their IP addresses, how their IP space was subnetted, and which

addresses were assigned where.

Now, fifteen+ years later and over 850 customers worldwide, VitalQIP is still the industry

leading product. The basic requirements of IP Address Management coupled with DNS and

DHCP services required has not changed over the years. What has changed is the network

trends and requirements of these networks that have made having a consolidated system like

VitalQIP essential to both enterprise and service provide companies. VitalQIP has met these

growing trends in every way – whether it be responding to new technologies such as IPv6, VoIP

or ENUM; or meeting the needs of our customers by introducing the Alcatel-Lucent Appliances

or provide tools such as better reporting or workflow manager to continue to provide

automation and efficiencies in customer‟s networks. The explosion of IP enabled devices and

networks along with policies and procedures has further escalated customer‟s needs of having

a proven, scalable IP Address Management solution in their architectures today. The following

section goes back to the basics to discuss some of the fundamental concepts.

In general, the term "IP management" can be summarized as a number of broad functions:

Configuring network nodes IP enabled devices with IP information

Monitoring IP address usage

Configuring host name to IP address lookup facilities

Auditing and tracking the changes in the IP address space

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Establishing policies and rules for utilizing the address space effectively and efficiently

We'll take a closer look at each of these areas from a historical perspective to understand the

value of IP management software in simplifying management of these areas.

1.3.1 Configuring network nodes and IP enabled devices with IP information

In order to communicate on an IP network, there continually more and more elements that

require IP Address to be assigned and managed to function properly in a environment –

routers, VoIP phones, mobile devices, medical devices etc. etc the list just keeps getting

bigger. A node or host requires an IP address so IP packets can be routed from and to

appropriate endpoints. In the early days of the Internet and IP, devices were given essentially

hard-coded IP addresses. Companies or institutions would make a request to an address

registry, such as the American Registry for Internet Numbers or ARIN, for an IP network

address. An IP network address is a block of contiguous IP addresses from which the

requesting institution could assign at will. Beyond having an IP address, IP nodes also needed

to know where to look up other nodes on the network. Believe it or not, this was actually

done by hard-coding a text file, hosts.txt, into each and every node. When the user of the

computer wanted to access another node, say Alcatel-Lucent.com, the computer would look

in the hosts.txt file for the IP address of Alcatel-Lucent.com.

The computer can't send an IP packet to a node name, so translating this name to an IP

address was critical to communicate the request over an IP network. A directory like

function was needed to provide a node name to IP address; this function evolved to what we

now know as the Domain Name System (DNS). The computer could then put its own address in

the source IP address field of the IP header, and populate the destination node's IP address in

the destination IP address field. With the growth in the number of IP devices, automated

methods such as Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) were invented and deployed to

automate the assignment of IP addresses to hosts. Additional parameters were piggybacked

along with the assigned IP address, such as what address to send name to address queries, and

many other "options." DHCP greatly simplified the configuration of IP hosts, especially as

laptops hit the scene and users were in need to addresses specific to their subnet, or point of

attachment.

Today these requirements still remain the same, but with the introduction of new IP based

technologies it becomes increasingly more challenging to operate manually with disjoint

solutions such as Microsoft etc.. That is why even after 13+ years of supporting IP Address

Management DNS, DHCP VitalQIP continues to provide a robust, flexible solution for mission

critical environments and has expanded to be able to provide not only the best in class most

robust solution but also the availability of a hardware appliance as an option to further

streamline processes. .

1.3.2 Monitoring IP address usage

In the early days, administrators would simply write down which user or computer had which

IP address. This was usually tracked on several pieces of paper or napkins though some

sophisticated users utilized spreadsheets. In order for IP routing to operate effectively, IP

routers had to know how to route IP packets to the appropriate destination. Routers had

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built-in mechanisms to communicate network reachability information. Essentially, routers

would state, "I can reach the 192.168.10.0 network in 3 hops," while another may brag, "I can

reach the 192.168.10.0 network in 2 hops!" Typically the route with the fewer hops was

chosen to route packets with a destination address within the 192.168.10.0 network.

As adoption of IP exploded in the early 1990's, available address space became scarcer.

Network administrators had to subdivide, or subnet, IP networks in order to maximize

utilization of their IP space. For example, subnetting provides a mechanism for dividing the

192.168.10.0 network further into a number of subnetworks. This is done by applying a "mask"

which determines the number of bits that define the network portion of the address (IP

addresses are represented as four dotted decimal numbers, but when it comes down to it,

they are 32 bit addresses!). Routers only care about the network to which to send the packet,

so they need to know the network, which requires knowledge of the network mask.

The number of bits in the mask is notated following the network address; e.g.,

192.168.10.0/26 indicates a mask of 26 bits. From our earlier example, one could create four

networks from the 192.168.10.0/24 network as: 192.168.10.0/26; 192.168.10.64/26;

192.168.10.128/26; and 192.168.10.192/26. Now instead of one network with 254 hosts, I

have four networks with 62 hosts each. An administrator could now assign these four

networks to four locations of 62 or fewer hosts for example, instead of using one network

address and using three others for the other three sites. As you can see, a reasonably sound

understanding of binary arithmetic is required for proper subnetting.

Today and in the future, the complexity of subnetting, growing networks and even as far as

the introduction of IPv6 as the next generation numbering plan makes manual use of IP

Addresses impossible. Now a network will be defined as 192.168.10.0.192.168.10.0/ VitalQIP

supports both IPv4 and IPv6 today.

1.3.3 Configuring host name to IP address lookup facilities

In section 1.3.1, we described the use of the hosts.txt file. This worked well when there were

a few universities dabbling with IP back in the 1970's. As a new host joined the Internet, the

word went forth to other "members" to update their hosts.txt files accordingly. A master

copy with all Internet hosts to IP address mappings was published and made available for easy

download. As you can imagine, this didn't scale too well. As the rate of new hosts accessing

the Internet grew, the rate of hosts.txt updates grew and more and more hosts grew out of

synch. The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) therefore embarked on a more scalable

solution. They arrived at what we know as the Domain Name System or DNS. DNS provides a

hierarchical delegation structure that is best illustrated by example.

Back when Alcatel-Lucent was founded, the Alcatel-Lucent IT group asked the naming

registrar, such as Network Solutions, for the domain name "Alcatel-Lucent.com." Network

Solutions noted that no one else reserved that name, so replied, "OK, you can have Alcatel-

Lucent.com, and everything 'beneath' it, but just tell me where to send folks looking for

Alcatel-Lucent.com or what's beneath." Essentially, Network Solutions delegated the name to

Alcatel-Lucent's IT group along with the responsibility for further handling delegation beneath

Alcatel-Lucent.com, say qip.Alcatel-Lucent.com. Alcatel-Lucent provided the IP addresses of

at least two DNS servers that knew how to translate Alcatel-Lucent.com, qip.Alcatel-

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Lucent.com, hr.ion.Alcatel-Lucent.com, etc. to IP addresses or at least knew who else to ask

down its own delegation chain.

This historical context helps summarize how IP address and IP naming services evolved from

being so simple that purely manual tracking methods were perfectly suitable, to becoming

very, very complex. This complexity grew in terms of keeping track of the growing number of

IP devices, which increasingly moved around with the use of laptop computers; VoIP phones,

IP enabled routers, monitoring IP address utilization with the complexity of variable length

subnetting and configuring name to address lookups. The need for software to manage all of

this grew increasingly during this time and continues today. The basic concept of what IPAM,

DNS and DHCP has not changed over the years, but what has changed are the things that IT

organizations, Service Providers, Management Service Providers etc. need to start thinking

about for the future.

1.3.4 Auditing and Tracking changes in the IP Address Space

Over the years monitoring, tracking and auditing of IP Addresses has become more and more

critical as security becomes more challenging and policies such as Sarbanes and Oxley become

requirements that need to be tracked and cared for. The use of VitalQIP for managing the

overall IP Address Space is very powerful and along with it brings a tremendous amount of

data that can provide view in to who, how and when access to the network is occurring and

when. Historically, there was not as much concerns of rogue devices appearing on a network

or rogue users because the IP Address Space was not as limited and things like security “break-

ins” did not exist. Now, these elements are day to day concerns of managers and need to be

cared for properly.

VitalQIP provides the tools to be able to not only manage and Monitor this space but also audit

and track it‟s usage by providing insight in to who, what, when things are occurring through

reporting and auditing.

1.3.5 Establishing policies and rules for utilizing the address space effectively and

efficiency.

Over the years, VitalQIP has taken the initiative to establish value add capabilities in the

product to further automate process and provide efficiencies of scale more effective use of

the address space and by leveraging automation. This was accomplished through Address

Allocation functionality. Address Allocation is automated IP address space allocation and

subnet creation that is a part of VitalQIP. It helps administrators manage network partitioning

or allocation, and warns when available address space begins to run out. User settable

thresholds provide this warning. Users can then apply to APNIC/ARIN/RIPE for more address

space before they are completely depleted. Address Allocation organizes IP address into

several levels. Each level is dependent on the next level for IP address space. The lowest

level is a block, the intermediate level is a pool, and the highest level is the pool hierarchy.

Address Allocation Provides a high-level management interface that associates individual IP

addresses with the corresponding address space delegated by Address Allocator. The command

line interface, application programming interface, and a Web-based graphical user interface

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were developed to allow access to provisioning information. Address Allocator allows for the

allocation of IP address space by using user defined rules and a hierarchical address pool

structure. As blocks of IP addresses are used within a pool, Address Allocator creates a subnet

is creates as follows:

Determines how many IP addresses are needed.

Analyzes the current address space usage for an unused range of the needed size.

Calculates the correct subnet mask.

Configures DHCP servers.

Configures DNS servers.

Address Allocator supports these steps by:

Organizing IP Address Space

Invoking Rule-Based Allocations

Performing Best-Fit Subnet Allocation

Providing Automatic Subnet and Object Creation

1.3.6 What’s New with the VitalQIP Next Generation Platform?

In addition to the traditional use of VitalQIP described above, Alcatel-Lucent has recently

released the next generation platform of VitalQIP® . The generation application introduces

new features as well as look and feel to continue to provide the most cutting edge solution in

the market today. With today's increased focus on converged technologies, the acceleration

of Voice over IP (VoIP) and IP Multimedia Subsystems (IMS) fast, easy and reliable

administration of IP Addresses and Domain Name System services is quickly becoming a critical

management issue. Now, throw IPv6 into the network environments, even the most seasoned

and experience professionals and organizations are facing significant challenges.

Alcatel-Lucent is focused on not only staying current with the latest technologies and trends

but also continuing to provide tools and features focused on enhancing the overall user

experience. Features such as: a new web-based GUI, enhanced navigation capabilities,

advanced API's for tighter integration and enhanced reporting functions provide users with a

next generation platform that will take customers into the future with improved efficiency

and flexibility. In addition, VitalQIP now offers a complete hardware software solution by

providing the option of running VitalQIP on integrated Intel based appliances for enhanced

patch processing, management and high availability solutions.

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1.4 Benefits

VitalQIP provides the following benefits:

Automation of IP address assignment increases end user productivity and reduces manual

processes as well as help desk calls.

Accurate, centralized IP network inventory reduces address assignment errors and links IP

device addresses to domain names. It also improves network moves/adds/changes

processes by providing IP address visibility to the individual object level, not just subnet

block.

Subnetting tools simplify and improve accuracy of subnetting operations and reduce the

requirement to remember binary arithmetic.

Hierarchical graphical user interface (GUI) allows viewing of IP network by domain,

network, subnet, subnet organization, OSPF area, DNS server, DHCP server, and even a

user definable hierarchy. This allows use of the software across a multitude of

constituencies with varying perspectives, hot buttons, and backgrounds. Flexible

administrator network resource visibility also increases security and improves

accountability.

DHCP failover capabilities and multiple DNS server redundancy maximize availability of IP

address and name services to clients, keeping them productive despite failures.

Flexibility to support existing BIND or Microsoft environments with full integration lowers

start up and ongoing costs.

Optional integrated VitalQIP Appliances to take advantage of the off the shelf hardware

software solution with extended capabilities for efficient patch management and

processing. As well as DNS High Availability.

Control

VitalQIP provides centralized IP address space, DNS, ENUM and DHCP management.

Speed

Centrally manage IP address space, DNS, ENUM and DHCP servers Plan your IP space

then simply push server configuration files to distributed DHCP/DNS servers.

Accuracy

VitalQIP ensures accurate, properly formatted configuration files are pushed to DNS

and DHCP servers to keep IP services available.

Delegation

VitalQIP enables delegation of responsibility with administrator profiles and granular

control of user permissions.

Security

VitalQIP provides access controls, SSL communications, and GSS-TSIG to prevent DNS

cache poisoning. DNSSEC support is planned for May 2007.

Scalability

Carrier class with proven scalability (millions of IP addresses).

Quality

Standards-based software designed under strict quality management and best

practices.

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Support

VitalQIP provides superior class maintenance and support.

Evolution

VitalQIP delivers 1 major releases/year, continuing to support latest

standards/technologies including IPv6 and appliance based solutions.

2 PRODUCT CAPABILITIES

VitalQIP ® is the most feature-rich IP management software product in the market. As the

market leader and through implementation of customer suggestions, the product has evolved

over the years to ensure that existing customers and future customers and continue to

leverage the most proven product in the market to keep pace with the trends in the IPAM

space today.

The Next Generation Platform for VitalQIP 7.x takes VitalQIP to a new level. Over the last 13

years of development VitalQIP has taken its robust understanding of the core competencies

related to IP Address Management, DNS and DHCP to extend its reach and offer support and

functionality to our customers responding to significant market trends. The following diagram

shows the functional components.

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2.1 Core Product

2.1.1 User interface

The VitalQIP Product has matured over the years from offering multiple interfaces to now

focusing on the next generation platform offering a new web based GUI.

Web 2.0 Web GUI

Command Line Interface

Soap XML interface

C/C++ API (VitalQIP API Toolkit)

Historically VitalQIP has maintained both a windows and motif GUI or the „Thick Client‟ as well

as a Web GUI.

The 7.3 Web GUI is explained in the VitalQIP Web Client User‟s Guide.

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The command line interface provides an extensive set of CLIs for users who prefer such an

interface. This interface is very similar to a UNIX command line with a command along with a

set of required and optional command arguments.

The API Toolkit provides a programmatic interface into VitalQIP and the Lucent DHCP server.

Enterprises or service providers wishing to integrate VitalQIP functions into a larger

management system infrastructure may choose this interface. The API provides a rich set of

C/C++ calls.

2.1.2 Features

The following are the key features of the VitalQIP product.

Web based GUI – The new web GUI

is friendlier, is more intuitive,

requires fewer mouse clicks, and

performs faster than the previous

GUI. Reduces human error in data

entry and device configuration

Command Line Interfaces -

(CLI‟s) are critical for integrating

and automating processes around

VitalQIP – all VitalQIP GUI functions

are available via the CLI‟s.

DNS and DHCP Management -

efficiently configure, automate,

integrate and administer DNS and

DHCP services across the entire

network - locally or globally

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API ToolKit - comprised of

Application Program Interface (API)

routines for extension and

integration of VitalQIP into other

critical applications the customer

might utilize.

SNMP - Provides SNMP Management

Information base (MIB) variables to

collect statistical information for

DNS and DHCP to enhance

monitoring, performance and

operational status for appliance

resources

Address Allocation - automates

network and subnet creation

processes with VitalQIP.

AutoDiscovery - allows customers

to inventory their network,

compare the result against the

VitalQIP database and produce

comparison reports and update the

database

DHCP Audit Manager - Historical

storage and reporting of IP and

MAC addresses, DHCP lease actions

such as grant, renew, release, and

decline, lease expiration dates and

VitalQIP IP object adds, modifies,

and deletes.

ENUM Manager - Simplifies

administration of ENUM domains

and NAPTR records, enables end-

to-end flow through provisioning of

subscribers and services

Access Control - Enables a third

level of authentication Userid,

password and MAC address and

provide an IP address consistent

with the client‟s class of service

Reporting - provides the user with

robust information to manage

pools, blocks, IPv4 subnets, IPv6

subnets, nodes, views and

allocation rules. Each report can

be formatted and saved as a file,

as well as displayed on the screen.

Microsoft Active Directory

integration – fully interact with

Active Directory DNS/DHCP.

Appliance Management – Optional

appliance offering allows full

automated VitalQIP software

management upgrade, roll back

and history versioning stored in a

MySQL database

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CyberGatekeeper additional feature – bring Network Access Control to endpoints managed by

VitalQIP DHCP. Asses, Quarantine, remediate and report dhcp based endpoints.

2.1.3 VitalQIP 7.3 Next Generation Web GUI

The web GUI was designed from QIP customers representing the worldwide customer‟s base and

VitalQIP Customer Advisory board.. It is modeled after the proven VitalQIP thick Client which has been

a customer favorite for over ten years. The 7.3 GUI improves user collaboration by expanding the

embedded Web 2.0 technology. Less mouse clicks, fewer screens to maneuver and Enhanced

performance has made the VitalQIP Web GUI state of the art.

The web GUI consists of seven basic tabs and an additional tab for add- on products.

MyView Tab

MyView Management – Allows for the administration and set-up of personal views, shared

views or “myView” to be set up for users or shared by users. This enables a master or

organization administrator to define and set up views of the system that have a narrower

scope, views that can be then assigned to one or more normal administrators and thereby

allow them to focus on their daily activities and only the infrastructure items for which they

are responsible.

Address Management Tab

The Address Management tab allows the user to manage IPV4, IPV6 network and subnets as well as

Nodes. This tab also allows the administration for IP address allocation.

IPV4: This tab is where the administration of IPV4 Networks, subnets and objects are

managed. Subnet organizations and the VitalQIP Visual IP space is also located here.

IPV6: This tab is where the administration of IPV6 seed blocks, address ranges and subnets

takes place.

Node: This is where multiple network interfaces are associated with single devices known as

a node

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Address Allocation - This tab allows users to define the network in terms of pools and blocks.

This is an alternative way of defining ones network than in the traditional Address

Management option. It provides the function to allocate IP address space by using user

defined rules and a hierarchical address pool structure. As blocks of IP addresses are used

within a pool, address allocation creates a subnet as follows:

o Determines how many IP addresses are needed.

o Analyzes the current address space usage for an unused range of the needed size.

o Calculates the correct subnet mask.

o Configures DHCP servers.

o Configures DNS servers.

DNS Tab

The DNS tab allows for the administration of DNS related configuration parameters

Zones : Add, modify and delete of DNS forward and reverse zones as well as Bind DNS Views

DNS servers : Add, modify and delete of DNS servers. Including all configuration parameters

associated with these servers

Non managed DNS servers : Provides management of DNS servers that are not directly

managed by VitalQIP

ACL templates: Management of Address control lists which control access permission for DNS

servers

Managed files: Manage the files associated with DNS servers

Nis/local files: Management for NIS updated servers

ENUM: management of ENUM configuration and NAPTER records

DHCP Tab

DHCP servers: Add, modify and delete of DHCP servers. Both primary and failover servers

DHCP Templates: Administration of DHCP related templates

DHCP Client Class: Management of user and vendor classes

Access Control: Allows management of a third level of authentication MAC address. This tab

manages the mapping of individual users to multiple devices via MAC address

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Infrastructure Tab

Manage Organization: Administration of VitalQIP organizations.

Administrator: Allows for very granular administration permission s and privileges.

Global Settings: Used to manage settings that are used globally across VitalQIP. Global

policies, object classes, contacts and locations are all managed here.

Templates: IPV4 address, subnet profile and reverse zone templates. IPV6 address templates

are managed here as well.

Attributes: This tab allows for the set up and management of the User Defined Attributes.

Attributes allow you to specify values you want to associate with elements such as pools,

blocks and nodes in the VitalQIP database. You can use these values to tie Address Allocation,

Address Management and DNS and DHCP infrastructure into your corporate processes. For

example, you can associate an employee‟s badge number of cost center with a subnet.

There are three components to attributes. The attributes themselves and attribute groups.

1. Attributes are individual pieces of information you want to associate with items in the

VitalQIP Database. Examples could be Employee Badge Number. Manager‟s Name.

Product Name or Department.

2. Attribute groups are a way to organize attribute names. Examples could be Employee

Information. Products or Departments. An attribute does not have to be assigned to an

attribute group or can be assigned to more than one attribute groups.

3. Infrastructure objects such as pools, blocks and nodes are defined on the attributes

section. You can associate an Attribute with any defined infrastructure object.

Domain Controllers: Active director domain controllers are managed here.

Reports Tab

Reports : VitalQIP has incorporated a new reporting package with the 7.x Platform. This

includes a free-ware tool call Jasper Reporting. In 7.1, reports are accessed through the Web

GUI and the traditional “Thick Client,: Reports provide the user with information to manage

pools, blocks, IPv4 subnets, IPv6 subnets, nodes, views and allocation rules. Each report can

be formatted and saved as a file, as well as displayed on the screen. You can reports from the

following locations:

From the Reports Tab

From the Reports icon on the toolbar

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From the Properties page of an item selected in the hierarchy.

Original Reports from the “Thick” client.

Tasks Tab

Scheduler – The feature allows tasks to be scheduled.

Change Password – Change user‟s current password.

Links Tab

This tab was reserved for additional features that were developed potentially outside the scope of

the core VitalQIP product but are integrated to the core appliance.

AutoDiscovery - AutoDiscovery allows you to inventory the network, compare the result

against the VitalQIP database and produce comparison reports. You can then use the

comparison reports to help define new networks, reconcile an existing VitalQIP database, and

detect rogue and duplicate IP addresses.

VitalQIP AutoDiscovery allows you to create profiles from your VitalQIP instance and

then run the network discovery function on that part of the network. Integrating with

VitalQIP for input eliminates the possibility of errors in data entry and makes the

discovery process seamless. Creation of profiles allows the user to run the discovery in

an “offline” mode even when it is not connected to VitalQIP database. The same

profile information is then used to extract the corresponding data from VitalQIP.

VitalQIP AutoDiscovery includes a configurable Diff Engine that can compare the two

inputs received from network data extraction and VitalQIP data extraction. The

output of the Diff Engine is displayed in a user-friendly HTML format. The users can

also filter the reports to see subsets of the report like view dynamic addresses, view

static addresses, filter out zero MAC addresses etc. For programmatic processing of

the output, this information is also available in an XML format.

AutoDiscovery includes the following components:

Network Data Extractor – Discovers the Ethernet and IP network elements and

related equipment configuration information for a set of one or more subnets

defining the scope of the network query. The Network Data Extractor uses

Request Profiles to determine the scope of network discovery and other

parameters applicable to the network discovery request.

VitalQIP Data Extractor – Extracts the corresponding VitalQIP object data for

the set of subnets used by the Network Data Extractor. The VitalQIP Data

Extractor uses the same Request Profiles as the Network Data Extractor to

determine the VitalQIP Organization and list of subnets from which to extract

the object data.

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Diff Engine – Compares the output of the Network Data Extractor and the

VitalQIP Data Extractor, and based on a configurable set of fields (referred to

as “Diff Keys”), generates a Diff Report showing the differences between the

two sets of data.

Administrative GUI – Permits the configuration of the Network Data Extractor

and the VitalQIP Data Extractor. In addition, it is the mechanism for invoking

each of these processes, and provides access to the various Diff reports.

Request Handler – Handles GUI/CLI requests to run Network Data Extractor,

VitalQIP Data Extractor and Diff Engine. It provides a common interface for all

three requests. It is logically made up of one request handler to interface with

each of the three components of a discovery job. A fourth request handler,

not shown in the illustration, permits all components to be run as a single

request.

2.1.4 Flexibility in Supporting Multi-Vendor Solution

VitalQIP is a centralized IP management tool, which is also used to configure DNS and DHCP servers

from a variety of vendors. This provides a tremendous amount of flexibility to bring VitalQIP in to

existing environments and provide consolidated management of the existing infrastructure.

VitalQIP supports the following DNS/DHCP servers.

Alcatel-Lucent DNS servers

Alcatel-Lucent DHCP servers

Microsoft DNS servers

Microsoft DHCP servers

Any BIND 8 or 9 compliant DNS server

Alcatel-Lucent Software Appliances in

a Virtual environment

Alcatel-Lucent Appliances

Alcatel-Lucent Software Appliances

Alcatel-Lucent DNS and DHCP on

Riverbed Wan Optimizer

End user PCs, broadband devices, etc. utilize RFC compliant DHCP or DNS transactions to interface

with these servers.

Please see release notes for the latest releases of software supported.

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2.1.5 VitalQIP Appliance Based Solution

VitalQIP Product Description

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Page 20 of 50

2.1.6 Application Programming Interfaces

In general. VitalQIP supports data exchange in XML, CSV and also allows SQL access. VitalQIP provides

a Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) based interface for North bound systems to data exchange and

other interactions. Interface messages are encoded using Extensible Markup Language (XML), and use

HTTP or HTTPS for transport. A Web Services Description Language (WSDL) document specifies

interface operations, their associated messages and message parameters, the schema for the data

types required by the messages, port types, and binding information. Selected transactions can be

scheduled. This interface could also be leverage should the need arise to integrate with other Alcatel-

Lucent or non-Alcatel-Lucent software products such as billing, radius, network access security,

trouble ticketing etc. etc.

The API Toolkit is a developer's toolkit comprised of the VitalQIP Application Program Interface (API)

routines and the Lucent Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) server API routines. These API

routines allow for the extension and integration of VitalQIP into other critical applications such as

asset tracing, other network management applications, and billing applications. The API provides a C

interface to VitalQIP functions. It is intended to serve those applications that must invoke VitalQIP

functions but cannot or should not use the existing command line utilities. Each API routine returns

an integer indicating success or failure. If the return code is less than zero, then an error occurred.

The value of the return code indicates the general error condition. In addition, the API provides

access to the VitalQIP internal error codes, enabling more detailed error analysis.

This expanded powerful set of APIs allows for the extension and integration of VitalQIP into other

critical applications. They allow an installation to integrate VitalQIP functions and information into

other systems, including other network management, asset tracking, or billing applications. The

components of the VitalQIP API Toolkit include:

Header files containing prototypes for functions and structure definition.

Library files required for compiling and linking the APIs with external customer applications.

API product documentation or programming guide.

2.1.7 Database

VitalQIP software and appliance solution is packaged with a Sybase relational database. In particular,

VitalQIP® comes with a run time license for Sybase. VitalQIP software only solution can run with an

Oracle database, which is supplied by the customer.

2.1.7.1 Data viewing and filtering capability

The Go/To Search capability along with CLIs and APIs provide the ability to extract portions of the

database based on search criteria. The database schema is also published and available should a

customer desire to write their own SQL calls.

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Alcatel-Lucent VitalQIP 7.3 Product Description Manual

Alcatel-Lucent VitalQIP 7.3 Product Description Manual

Alcatel-Lucent VitalQIP 7.3 Product Description Manual

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