Net Optics Director Switch User Manual


 
Director
6
Typical Application
The following diagram shows a typical application using Director to implement a comprehensive, consolidated monitoring
infrastructure.
www.netoptics.com
1
2
B
A
A B
IDS
Analyzer 2
Analyzer 1
RMON 1 RMON 2
Forensic
Director-centric network monitoring infrastructureFigure 2:
In this example, eight network links are monitored by six monitoring devices. The company's external access is protect-
ed by a rewall, shown in the upper left of the diagram. The link runs through a router, then in-line through Director,
and then to a switch that distributes trafc throughout a department.
Network Links
The rest of the department's switches are shown, but only the connections to Director are illustrated. The four depart-
ment switches shown in the lower right are cross-connected for fault tolerance. All four of the cross-connected links
are passed in-line through Director (as indicated by the slanting purple lines) so they can be thoroughly monitored for
performance tuning, security, and trouble-shooting. Because so many critical links pass in-line through Director, it's
good to know that they are completely passive connections—Director does not slow down or interfere with the in-line
trafc, and the links stay open to pass trafc even if both of the Director power supplies are removed. (When power
is removed, 10/100/1000 Copper in-line links may be dropped for a short period of time —less than 1 second—while
relays switch to open the link. Subsequently, the network re-establishes the links and trafc resumes owing.)
Purple line
indicates an
in-line Tap
Detail of in-line Taps shown in Figure 2Figure 3:
In the middle of Figure 2, three other departmental switches are monitored through their Span ports. One of the
switches handles 10GbE trafc, so its Span port goes to one of the Director 10GbE XFP ports. One of the other
switches' 1GbE Span ports carries three distinct types of trafc–e-mail, VoIP, and Web pages–as indicated by the three
colored circles on the Span link.