{"id":978,"date":"2018-05-23T15:23:26","date_gmt":"2018-05-23T15:23:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/live-infoblox-blog.pantheonsite.io\/?p=978"},"modified":"2020-05-06T10:27:06","modified_gmt":"2020-05-06T17:27:06","slug":"top-5-reports-that-increase-network-visibility-make-you-a-better-manager","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.infoblox.com\/blog\/community\/top-5-reports-that-increase-network-visibility-make-you-a-better-manager\/","title":{"rendered":"Top 5 Reports that Increase Network Visibility & Make You a Better Manager"},"content":{"rendered":"

If You Can See It, You Can Manage It<\/h1>\n

When it comes to the network, visibility is everything.\u00a0 Without a comprehensive, real-time network view at any time from any place, how do you know who is accessing your data, from which devices and to what effect?\u00a0 How do you stop bad actors from stealing your data or infecting your systems?\u00a0 If you\u2019re relying on manual processes and disparate solutions to run and analyze your network, how can you make fast, accurate decisions to ensure application security, availability, and performance?\u00a0 And why use\u00a0your precious time and\u00a0dev resources to spin-up a project, research and build reports, when powerful, engineered, pre-built reports and predictive analytics are available at your fingertips?<\/p>\n

The good news is that there are some great tools available to support network visibility and access.\u00a0 One of those tools is the\u00a0Infoblox Reporting & Analytics<\/a>\u00a0with\u00a0Query Logging<\/a>\u00a0solution integrated within the Infoblox DNS, DHCP and IPAM (DDI) Grid.\u00a0 It can deliver the visibility you need, and real-time knowledge and network intelligence to make you an effective manager.<\/p>\n

The Top 5 Reports<\/h1>\n

Over the years, Infoblox gained a lot of reporting and analytics insights from customers, architects, administrators, engineers, SMEs, sales, and others.\u00a0 This resulted in a significant library of pre-built, customizable reports documented in the\u00a0Sample Report Guide<\/a>.\u00a0 These reports can be accessed through the dashboards tab, exported as a .pdf, scheduled to run and be distributed in advance to minimize effort.\u00a0 We\u2019d like to show you the top 5 reports, and how they can deliver powerful, real-time network intel, save you time and money and improve the way you manage.\u00a0 Let the countdown begin.<\/p>\n

Top Report #5: DHCP Lease History<\/h2>\n

Top report #5 is a favorite among Network and Security Admins because it shows the DHCP history for a given timeframe.\u00a0 From a\u00a0Network Admin perspective<\/em><\/strong>, it reveals where clients roam around on the network.\u00a0 From a\u00a0Security perspective,\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>it\u2019s very powerful to see which IP addresses a malware-infected client has had over time and then perform a log correlation to discover malicious activities done on the network. \u00a0In fact, this report is really a must-have for Audit and Compliance teams engaged with historical IP malware investigations simply due to the time-savings.\u00a0 Rather than digging through hundreds of thousands of syslog data lines, an Admin can just enter an IP address, timeframe, corresponding MAC address, device or user information and get right to the data, saving hours-on-hours of manual, mind-numbing tedium.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Top Report #5: DHCP Lease History<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Service Area<\/strong><\/td>\nAudit\/Compliance<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Purpose<\/strong><\/td>\nShows DHCP history for a given timeframe<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Primary User<\/strong><\/td>\nNetwork\/Security Admins<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Importance<\/strong><\/td>\nQuickly pinpoints who was where & correlates systems to IPs<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Use Case<\/strong><\/td>\nA device was compromised last month. Lease times are 24 hours. Which IPs has it had in the last month?<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

\"NIOS<\/p>\n

Top Report #4: DNS Domains Queried by Client<\/h2>\n

This report provides a granular query log search and is key to both Network and Security staff. \u00a0For\u00a0Network teams<\/em><\/strong>, it enables the troubleshooting of an impaired network device.\u00a0 For\u00a0Security teams<\/em><\/strong>, it reveals all of the client\/domain queries and all of the domains queried by a given client.\u00a0 This is very helpful during a security investigation, where we can focus on a particular domain name associated with malicious activity and find every client that was querying it at a given time.\u00a0 Or, we can see what else a client was querying, which makes it simple, fast and easy to find what you\u2019re looking for.\u00a0This report requires the Data Connector to improve performance and minimize bandwidth impact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Top Report #4: DNS Domains Queried by Client<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Service Area<\/strong><\/td>\nNetwork\/Security<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Purpose<\/strong><\/td>\nDisplays a granular query log search<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Primary User<\/strong><\/td>\nNetwork & Security Admins<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Importance<\/strong><\/td>\nIdentify which clients are querying for specific domains or all the activity of a given clients<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Use Case<\/strong><\/td>\nView historical queries for malware domains before threat intel detects a problem to better determine infestation date<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

\"NIOS<\/p>\n

Top Report #3: DNS Query Rate by Member<\/h2>\n

The DNS Query Rate by Member Report specifically addresses application performance by showing query volume over time on a member-by-member basis.\u00a0 It is most frequently used by\u00a0DDI<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Applications\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>teams because it identifies DNS utilization trends and anomalies within the infrastructure.\u00a0 Because it is a trend report, spikes or dips typically indicate that something might be wrong or that something has changed. \u00a0This is a great report to see what is going on from a DNS perspective to highlight query rates, anomalies, top talkers and NX domains, giving you quick insights that might otherwise take hours to obtain from manual tools and a multi-system environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Top Report #3: DNS Query Rate by Member<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Service Area<\/strong><\/td>\nApplications Performance<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Purpose<\/strong><\/td>\nShows query volume per member<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Primary User<\/strong><\/td>\nDDI\/Applications Admins<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Importance<\/strong><\/td>\nIdentifies DNS utilization trends and anomalies<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Use Case<\/strong><\/td>\nCorrelates historical application performance issues to DNS query volumes<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

\"NIOS<\/p>\n

Top Report #2: DHCP Message Rate Trend<\/h2>\n

The #2 report shows DHCP activity by message type over time.\u00a0 It displays the entire discover, offer, request and acknowledgment status, so it provides a broad view of how your DHCP infrastructure is changing across a specified timeframe.\u00a0 This report is the DHCP equivalent of the DNS Query Rate Report #3 that we just looked at, so it contains similar metrics to help you easily spot anomalies.\u00a0 It\u2019s most often used by\u00a0DDI<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Applications<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0teams but can also be used by\u00a0Audit<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0teams.\u00a0 It enables you to keep a pulse on the DHCP environment and provide triage and troubleshooting when things go awry.\u00a0 For example, if a printer starts making a bunch DHCP requests so that other network clients can\u2019t get an IP address, this report would show the red requests line spiking to quickly alert you about a problem.\u00a0 It can also be configured to send alerts, so if you know your normal traffic pattern, any activity outside the range can trigger a notification pinpointing the exception so you don\u2019t scan this report every day.\u00a0 This delivers the intel you need and saves you time, so you can focus on higher business value initiatives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Top Report #2: DHCP Message Rate Trend<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Service Area<\/strong><\/td>\nDDI\/Applications\/Audit<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Purpose<\/strong><\/td>\nIdentifies DHCP utilization trends and anomalies<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Primary User<\/strong><\/td>\nDDI\/Applications Admins<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Importance<\/strong><\/td>\nIdentifies DNS utilization trends and anomalies<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Use Case<\/strong><\/td>\nCorrelates historical application performance issues to DHCP<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

\"NIOS<\/p>\n

Top Report #1: IPAMv4 Network Usage Statistics<\/h2>\n

The #1 report focuses on network utilization and is critical for Network Admins. It\u2019s important because it helps prevent resource conflicts, running out of IP addresses and clients not getting on the network. By leveraging the dataset to understand and predict utilization proactively, the drama can be prevented. Plus, it simplifies manual operations, as you don\u2019t have to look for metrics in various places, manage spreadsheets or work-built tools. Instead, you can see it all in one place with all of the powerful filtering options available, saving you grief and hassle, and giving you peace-of-mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Top Report #1:\u00a0<\/strong>\u00a0IPAMv4 Network Usage Statistics<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Service Area<\/strong><\/td>\nCapacity Planning<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Purpose<\/strong><\/td>\nDisplays network utilization<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Primary User<\/strong><\/td>\nNetwork Admins<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Importance<\/strong><\/td>\nPrevents resource conflicts<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Use Case<\/strong><\/td>\nProactively identify networks that are approaching full utilization<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

\"NIOS<\/p>\n

These are just a sampling of the over 120 customizable reports available to increase your visibility across the network, give you instant access to current data, save you time and money, streamline and automate operations, and enable you to be a better manager of the network and resources in your care.<\/p>\n

Learn more:<\/h1>\n