Does Your NPM Solution Include a Cloud-Based Device Management Service?

Here’s Why it Should

Having a network performance monitoring (NPM) platform is a consideration for most DevOps teams when designing a new network infrastructure, but many overlook the importance of a device management service (DMS).

Devs add packet capture and analysis probes into each segment of the network. As a network grow, more probes are added. The ability to monitor and troubleshoot each one becomes unmanageable.

A DMS becomes a must if a company hopes to scale. You might be surprised to learn that not every NPM includes a device management component.

If you have a small network, or if your network is a data center with just one large capture appliance, that might be alright.

But for everyone else, a DMS should be a “must” in your NPM vendor selection. A few specifics to ask your NPM vendor about their device management services include:

• Does the DMS allow you to manage the probes from a centralized dashboard?
• Is maintenance for DMS included in the NPM price, or broken out separately?
• Is this hosted in the cloud or does it require hardware? (The answer you want is cloud)

With increasingly distributed networks and permanently remote workforces here to stay, traffic has escaped the simple corporate network and data center architecture. Monitoring and troubleshooting today is more complex and involves VPNs and exponentially more hardware and software probes.

Benefits of using a Device Management Service

If the IP address of your NTP server changes, a global change is required. Accomplishing this without a DMS is intimidating, to say the least. The time it would take, and the accuracy required would be a massive undertaking.

Approach the same requirement with a cloud-based DMS and the global change can be made within minutes from a few clicks on a dashboard.

Automated deployment is another benefit of a DMS. Minimizing manual involvement reduces the chance of errors. If a probe can connect to the device management system in the cloud, register, activate, configure, and update itself to the latest version, there is no room for manual configuration error.

Zero-touch deployment makes the probe ready from the moment it is available on the dashboard.

DMS tools have functionality that extends beyond making simple probe configuration changes. It monitors a probe’s health and key vitals like CPU, memory, and disk space.

A DMS  empowers devs to proactively monitor, troubleshoot and resolve probe issues before it becomes a network problem.

About LiveAction

LiveAction’s NPM solution, LiveWire comes with a cloud-based DMS with a simple, centralized user interface. Purchase LiveWire today to get access to scalable, real-time device management.

Image from LiveWire’s DMS platform