DEPLOYMENT GUIDE

Network Insight Deployment Guide

NIOS 8.1

© 2017 Infoblox Inc. All rights reserved. Network Insight Deployment Guide, NIOS 8.1 - May 2017 Page 1 of 32
Table of Contents
BEST PRACTICES FOR CONFIGURING NETWORK INSIGHT DISCOVERY:..............................................................3
DESCRIPTION OF OPTIONAL PARAMETERS ......................................................................................................8
PORT SCANNING .........................................................................................................................................................8
SMART IPV4 PING SWEEP .......................................................................................................................................... 10
NETBIOS SCANNING................................................................................................................................................. 10
DISCOVERY PROCEDURE:.............................................................................................................................. 10
PREREQUISITE .......................................................................................................................................................... 10
GRID AND MEMBER DISCOVERY PROPERTIES .................................................................................................................. 10
CONVERSION PROCEDURES .......................................................................................................................... 17
CONVERTING UNMANAGED DEVICES TO MANAGED DEVICES ........................................................................................... 18
CONVERT UNMANAGED INTERFACES TO MANAGED STATUS ............................................................................................ 19
CONVERT UNMANAGED NETWORKS TO MANAGED STATUS............................................................................................. 21
CONVERT UNMANAGED NETWORKS UNDER IPAM TO MANAGED STATUS ......................................................................... 23
AUTOMATING CONVERTING UNMANAGED NETWORKS TO MANAGED STATUS ................................................................... 25
CONFLICT RESOLUTION IN NETWORK INSIGHT .............................................................................................. 28
RESOLVING PORT RESERVATION CONFLICTS .................................................................................................................. 30
RESOLVING MULTIPLE CONFLICTS ............................................................................................................................... 30

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Best practices for configuring Network Insight Discovery:
Navigate to Grid → Grid Manager → Discovery → Toolbar → Edit → Grid Discovery Properties.

Use the enabled default settings which are:

SNMP Collection - Network Insight uses SNMP to collect traceroute/path information, vendor and
model, SNMP credential collection, routing and ARP tables, switch port data, and VLAN configuration
data.

CLI Collection - Network Insight uses SSH or telnet to connect to devices to collect IP configuration,
port configuration, and routing tables.

Automatic ARP Refresh before Switch Port Polling - refreshes ARP caches on switches and switch-
routers in the managed network before NIOS performs polling of switch ports. Enabling this feature
applies only to switched Ethernet devices. This feature enables more accurate detection of all endpoint
devices on L2 switches. Without ARP refresh, some endpoint devices may not be detected.

Switch Port Data Collection- this enables the probe to poll l2 enterprise switches. The
recommendation is to poll every hour.

Disable Use DHCP routers as seed routers.

Navigate to Grid → Grid Manager → Discovery → Toolbar → Edit → Grid Discovery Properties →
Advanced.

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Use the most minimal amount of network containers as possible. For example, use network containers
that use the IP address’s natural mask such as 10.0.0/8 to contain your 10 subnets.

For sub containers and/or networks, override discovery settings as little as possible. Every time an
override is set extra resources are created and used under the covers and could impact performance
over time.

Use as few Seed Routers as possible. Using one as close to the core as possible is recommended.

Navigate to Grid → Grid Manager → Discovery.

Click on a Discovery device and edit the properties.

Click on Seed.

Click on the + button to add the IP address of a seed router.

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Use Exclusions for IP addresses you want excluded from discovery.

Navigate to Data Management → IPAM → selected Network container.

Click on the container and the list of IP subnets will appear.

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Click on the selected IP subnet and the list of IP addresses will appear.

Click on the check box for the IP address you wish to exclude from discovery.

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Go to the Toolbar and click on Exclusion.

The IP address will be highlighted in an aqua color to indicate the IP address is excluded from
discovery.

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Description of optional parameters

Port Scanning
Port Scanning allows the Network Insight probes to scan for open TCP ports on a device based upon
an adjustable TCP port list.

Navigate to Grid → Grid Manager → Discovery → Toolbar → Edit → Grid Discovery Properties.

Click on the check box for Port Scanning to enable and click on Save & Close.

An accompanying parameter is called Profile Device. While just enabling port scanning will tell what
TCP ports are open, profile device will try to identify the device by based upon the open TCP port
numbers. In the absence of SNMP access, the Profile Device function is usually the only way to identify
devices that do not support SNMP. If you disable Profile Device, devices accessible via SNMP are still
correctly identified; all other devices are assigned a device type of Unknown.

Navigate to Grid → Grid Manager → Discovery → Toolbar → Edit → Grid Discovery Properties.

Click on the check box for Port Scanning and Profile Device to enable. Click Save & Close.

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On the Advanced Tab, the screenshot shows the TCP Scan Technique: SYN or Connect. When you
use the SYN technique, the discovery sends a TCP SYN packet to establish a connection on a TCP
port. If the port is open, the host replies with a SYN ACK response. The discovery does not close the
port connection. The CONNECT technique is a three-way TCP handshake. The discovery starts with
the same process as the SYN technique by sending the TCP SYN packet. A response containing a
RST flag indicates that the port is closed. If the host replies with a SYN ACK response, discovery sends
a RST packet to close the connection. If there is no reply, the port is considered filtered. TCP scanning
is a deliberate and accurate discovery method, enabling detection of all active hosts on a network
provided that there are no firewalls blocking TCP packet exchanges.

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Smart IPv4 Ping Sweep
The ICMP Smart Ping Sweep option enables brute-force subnet Ping sweeps on IPv4 networks.
Subnet ping sweeps are used as a last resort in the discovery process. A subnet ping sweep is
performed if Network Insight is unable to identify any network devices in a given subnet. Subnet ping
sweeps are performed no more that once per day, and will end the ping sweep on a given subnet once
Network Insight discovers a network device and is able to collect data from it.
Note: Smart subnet ping sweeps will not be performed on subnets larger than/22.

NetBIOS Scanning
The NetBIOS method queries IP addresses for an existing NetBIOS service. This method detects
active hosts by sending NetBIOS queries and listening for NetBIOS replies. It is a fast discovery that
focuses on Microsoft hosts or non-Microsoft hosts that run NetBIOS services.

Discovery Procedure:

Prerequisite
This deployment guide assumes Network Insight as a standalone, consolidator and/or probes have
been installed on the Infoblox Grid. Refer to the NIOS Administrator’s Guide for more information.

Grid and member discovery properties

Navigate to Grid → Grid Manager → Discovery → Toolbar → Edit → Grid Discovery Properties.

Use default discovery setting as much as possible. The screenshot below shows the default polling
discovery settings for both the basic and advanced sections.

When done with any adjustments, click on Save & Close.

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Note: Disable Use DHCP routers as seed routers. This feature creates a seed router entry for every
DHCP range, which can lead to performance issues.

After reviewing the Polling parameters, click on Credentials to enter the credentials for the discovered
devices. The credential types are SNMP v1/v2, SNMPv3, and CLI. The example screen shots below
show SNMP v1/v2, SNMP3, and CLI. When done entering credentials,

Click on Save & Close

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.

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Network Insight performs discovery constantly. Each network device is polled roughly once an hour.
However, if your network policies dictate a blackout period for non-essential network services, you can
define a blackout periods. Click on the Blackout button. Click on Save & Close when done.

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Click on the Enable Discovery Blackout box to enable and then click on the calendar below. Click OK
when done.

Note: The duration can be set for X amount of minutes, hours, or days. Click OK when done

If you are using Network Insight in a VRF environment, you’ll need to map VRFs to Network Views.
This can be done manually or you can configure rules to do the mapping automatically.

Enable the automatic VRF mapping rules defined below for unassigned VRFs: Select this to
enable automatic VRF mapping so you can define mapping rules that Network Insight uses to map
network views to unassigned VRFs that match the criteria of the rules.

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Enable the automatic VRF mapping rules and system mapping extensions: Select this to enable
the VRF Mapping Rules table so you can define mapping rules that Network Insight uses to map
network views to unassigned VRFs that match the criteria of the rules; and in cases where none of the
rules match a VRF name, Network Insight maps the VRF to the network view from which one of the
interfaces the unassigned VRF is reached.

Disable automatic VRF mapping and only use manually defined VRF mapping: Select this to
disable the VRF Mapping Rules table. When you select this, Network Insight does not perform any
evaluation of the VRF mapping rules. You can manually assign or unassign network views to the
discovered VRFs.

When you enable automatic VRF mapping, you can add mapping rules to the VRF Mapping Rules
table, as follows:

Click the Add icon, and the appliance adds a row to the table.

In the table, click each of the following fields and enter the values accordingly:

Network View: The network view that you want to use for all matching VRFs. You can click this field
and select a network view from the drop-down list that displays all the configured network views,
including the default network view.

Order: The order and priority in which Network Insight evaluates the mapping rules. Each time you add
a new rule, the appliance automatically appends the rule to the end of the list and assigns the next
incremental number to the rule. To reorder the list, you can select a rule and use the up and down
arrows next to the table to move the rules to its desired position so you can set the priority for the rule
evaluation. Network Insight evaluates the rules based on the order, starting with 1 as the highest
priority.

Criteria: The criteria that Network Insight uses to match the VRF name of an unassigned VRF. You can
use POSIX regular expressions to define the mapping criteria. The appliance validates the rule when
you save the configuration, and it returns an error message if the criteria is invalid. For more
information about regular expressions,

Comment: Enter a comment about the VRF mapping rule. Click the Add icon again to define another
mapping rule. 4. Save the configuration

An important item in network discovery is adding a seed router. Network Insight will use the seed
router to access the routing table to discover the network. The recommendation is to use a seed router
that is in the core of the network or closest to the core of the network.

To add a seed router, use the following instructions:

Navigate to Grid → Grid Manager → Discovery.

Click on the Probe member and then click Edit button.

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Click on the Seed button.

Click on the + button to add a seed router and then type in the IP address of the seed router under the
router column. Click Save & Close.

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Define a top-level Network Container to consolidate IP subnets. For example, create a network
container like 10.0.0.0/8 to contain all of the subnets under the 10 networks.

Conversion Procedures
After a discovery, key information is collected and displayed in the following tabs:

Data Management, Devices, Interfaces, Networks, IP Addresses, and Assets tabs of Grid
Manager. You can view information about each discovered entity in one of these tabs.

A discovered entity is considered unmanaged if it is discovered in a network for which no information is

being stored in the NIOS database. You are not able to configure unmanaged objects in NIOS.
Depending on the nature of the discovered entity, you may convert certain unmanaged entities into
managed objects so you can manage them through Grid Manager. When an entity is in the managed
state, you can configure settings such as applying permissions to it, limiting who can modify the
configurations and deployments, and when those changes can be applied. You cannot do so with
unmanaged objects.

Grid Manager allows you to convert certain unmanaged devices, interfaces, networks, and assets to
the following IPAM object types:

When converting unmanaged entities to managed objects in NIOS, you can choose to convert them
one at a time or as a group.

To convert a single entity, just select a specific entity and perform the conversion. To convert multiple
entities to the same IPAM object type, you can select the entities you want to manage and then perform
a bulk conversion.

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Converting Unmanaged Devices to Managed Devices

Navigate to Data Management → Devices

Select a device that has a No in the Managed column. In the screen shot above, we will select switch
name of ‘stack2.acme.com’.

Click on the corresponding wheel for switch ‘stack2.acme.com’. Select Convert and this expands to
another menu. Select either To Host, To A Record, To PTR Record or To Fixed Address.

An editor for each of the selections will appear like the following:

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Fill in the field for the General tab. You can also define the other settings if needed. Refer to online
help for more details.

Click Save & Close.

Convert Unmanaged Interfaces to Managed Status

Interfaces that appear in the Interfaces table for a device may be converted to managed status, under
specific circumstances. If an interface is bound to an IP address that is present in an IPAM network (for
example, a leaf network inside a network container under IPAM), that interface can be converted to
managed status.

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From the Data Management tab, select the Devices tab.

Click the Next Page and Last Page icons to locate the device through which you want to locate the
interfaces to convert.

Click the Name link of the device.

Click the Interfaces tab for the chosen device. This tab lists all ports discovered on the device.

To convert a single interface,

Click the Action icon next to the interface you want to convert (this automatically selects it)

select Convert → To Host, To A Record, To PTR Record, or To Fixed Address from the menu.

To convert multiple interfaces (bulk conversion),

Select the check boxes of the interfaces you want to convert.

From the Toolbar, select Convert → To Host, To A & PTR Record, or To Fixed Address.

For a single interface: The respective object editor appears based on the conversion type you have
selected. For example, if you select To Host, the Host editor appears.

In the editor, define the required General settings for the new object. You can also define other settings
you need from any of the tabs in the editor. For details about how to configure these settings, refer to
the online Help in Grid Manager or see the appropriate chapters in this guide.

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Convert Unmanaged Networks to Managed Status

Unmanaged networks listed under discovered devices present the same conversion features as
networks listed under IPAM.

Begin by examining the Data Management → Devices page,

Click a discovered device name’s wheel icon and click the device name hotlink.

Open the Networks tab. The Managed column shows one of three possible states for all discovered
networks on each device:

Blank value–indicates that the network is not known to IPAM, because insufficient information is
available to identify and catalog the network at the present time, or because the network listed at the
device level is for a loopback interface, a disconnected network, or a network prefix that is overlapped
by a larger network encompassing that prefix and defined in IPAM. These are also called non-NIOS
networks. At the device level, non-NIOS networks are highlighted in light grey;

No–indicates that the network is not managed under IPAM/Grid Manager, but enough information is
catalogued that the network can be converted to Managed state. This state is required before a network
can be converted to managed status. Networks in this state are highlighted in yellow.

Yes–The network is currently managed under IPAM, converted to an IPAM network. At the device
level, managed networks are highlighted in white.

Navigate to Data Management → Devices → selected device → Networks.

Click on the wheel icon.

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Click Convert.

Fill in the General section and any other sections.

Click Save & Close.

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Convert Unmanaged Networks under IPAM to Managed Status

The IPAM tab lists all discovered networks as unmanaged, highlighted in yellow. Administrators cannot
apply services or IPAM objects to IP addresses in unmanaged networks until the networks are
converted to managed status. You can explore unmanaged networks through the IP Map and IP List
views, but many operations cannot be carried out on unmanaged networks, including editing, splitting,
resizing, permissions changes and other tasks.

Unmanaged networks can be converted at the IPAM main page and at the device level under
Data Management –> Devices, selecting a device and opening the Networks page.

Under IPAM, the Managed column for the Network tables can show one of two possible states for all
discovered IPAM networks:
● No–Shows that the network is not managed under IPAM/Grid Manager, but enough information
is catalogued that the device can be converted to Managed state. This state is required before a
network can be converted to Managed status.
● Yes–The network shown in the table is now Managed under IPAM, converted to an IPAM
network.

Navigate to Data Management → IPAM → selected network container (if needed)

Select a network and click on the corresponding wheel icon.

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Click Convert.

Fill in the General Section and any other sections.

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Click Save & Close

Automating Converting Unmanaged Networks to Managed Status

To automate the conversion of IP addresses of discovered entities from “unmanaged” to “managed” in

a specific network view, you can configure conversion rules that Network Insight uses to automatically
create new DNS records or update existing data for the discovered IP addresses. Network Insight
automatically converts newly discovered IP addresses to host records, A and PTR records, or fixed
addresses based on your configuration. You can define templates that Network Insight uses to create
new records by using supported variables and functions.

Note that corresponding DNS zones in a selected network view must already exist in order for Network
Insight to add DNS records during the conversion. Otherwise, Network Insight does not add any DNS
records and it logs a message to the syslog.

Network Insight automatically adds DNS records based on the following conditions:
● The corresponding DNS zones must already exist in the NIOS database. Network Insight does
not automatically create DNS zones for the records.
● To create a PTR record, the corresponding reverse-mapping zone must exist.
● A DNS zone cannot be associated with more than one DNS view. Network Insight does not
create DNS records for zones that are associated with multiple DNS views.
● NIOS adds new DNS records only if the discovered_name for the discovered IP address is
available and there is no conflict with information about the associated network view.

On subsequent discovery jobs, if an IP for a VM is removed, the corresponding DNS records are
removed accordingly. If the IP for a VM is changed, the IP address in the corresponding DNS record is
changed accordingly. If the DNS record name template is changed, all the DNS records are replaced
with the DNS records using the new template. All administrative actions for these change are recorded
in the audit log. Summary of the changes are logged in the syslog.

Note: Network Insight updates only records that are created by the Network Insight process. It does not
create or update DNS records that are originally created by other admin users.

To add automatic conversion rules:

Navigate to Grid → Grid Manager → Toolbar → Edit → Grid Discovery Properties.

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Click on the Conversion Policy tab.

Click on Enable the automatic conversion rules defined for newly discovered IP addresses.

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The Update discovered data for managed objects is enabled by default. Enter the following:

Network View - From the drop-down list, select the network view in which your conversion rule will take
effect. Note that this rule applies only to objects in the selected network view. If you have multiple
network views, you must configure a separate policy for each network view.

Template - Define a naming template that Network Insight uses to automatically create DNS records
for the unmanaged IP addresses in the network view. You can use the following syntax:
${substitution}, where substitution can be a supported variable or function. Note that each IPv6
address substitution is unwrapped into dotted presentation. For example, when you enter
${discovered_name}.corp100.com and the discovered_name for the asset is XYZ, the DNS name for
this IP becomes XYZ.corp100.com. When you enter $dev-{ip_address_octet3}.corp100.com and
the IP for the asset is2dba::db8::1, the DNS name for this IP becomes dev-3.corp100.com. When you
enter ${ip_address[7]}.corp100.com for an IPv6 address and if the IP for the asset is
2001:db8:acad::1, the DNS name becomes b.corp100.com. You can also use the following functions
in the naming template: dashed, reversed, and underscored. For example, when you enter
${dashed(${ip_address})}-corp100.com and the IP is 1.2.3.4, the DNS name becomes 1-2-3-4-
corp100.com. When you enter ${reversed(${ip_address})}-corp100.com and the IP is 1.2.3.4, the
DNS name becomes 4.3.2.1-corp100.com.

Conditions - Enter the matching conditions for the conversion rule. You can use magic variables,
supported variables, operators, and functions in the condition. When Network Insight finds IP
addresses that match this condition, it will convert the IP addresses into DNS records (Hosts, A/PTR
records, or fixed addresses) based on your selected conversion type. For example, if you want to
match IP addresses that do not have an FQDN in the discovered_name, you can enter this condition:
${isFQDN(${discovered_name})} == false AND ${discovered_name} == ‘unknown’. If you want to

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match devices from the network 137.65.75.0/24 with the name starting with "Serial0", you can enter
this condition: ${ip_belongs_to("137.65.75.0/24")} == true AND ${discovered_name} like "Serial0".

Conversion Type - From the drop-down list, select the DNS record type that you want Network insight
to convert the unmanaged IP addresses into. You can convert an unmanaged IP into Host, A/PTR, or
Fixed Address. When you select A/PTR, Network Insight converts each IP into A and PTR records
simultaneously.

Comment (optional) - Enter description about this policy to distinguish it from others. For example, if
the policy is used to identify and convert IP addresses with discovered_name that does not contain an
FQDN, you can enter “No FQDN in discovered_name.” as the comment to remind yourself about this
conversion rule.

Note: For more information on Conversion Parameters, refer to the ‘Supported Conversion Parameter’
section in the Infoblox NIOS Administrator Guide.

Conflict Resolution in Network Insight

You can sometimes encounter conflicts when defining port reservations for IPAM-managed objects
such as Fixed IP addresses or host records. The quickest way to locate any conflicts in Grid Manager is
to open the Conflicts Smart Folder as noted in the screen shot below.

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Numerous types of conflicts are possible:
● Device Information conflict;
● Port Reservation conflict, including Used Port Reservation conflicts (usually resulting from a
request to reserve a port that has already been assigned to another IPAM object);
● Fixed address conflict;
● IP Address conflicts;
● DHCP Range conflicts (such as: Discovered address is within an existing DHCP range but
does not match an existing lease, fixed address, or exclusion range);
● MAC Address conflict (such as: Discovered MAC Address conflicts with existing fixed address).
Note: When you execute discovery (Discovery → Discovery Now from the Toolbar), the
appliance does not send SNMP trap if it finds any conflicting information between the NIOS data
and the discovered data.

The Conflict Resolution wizard automatically recognizes the object associated with the conflict and
ensures that changes you make during resolution are applied correctly to the object. An example
appears below.

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Resolving Port Reservation Conflicts
Sometimes, administrators may accidentally request a device port to be reserved for an IP address
when the port is already reserved for another object, or try to apply a different port to an object that
already has a port reservation. When these cases arise, Grid Manager reports a conflict.

To resolve port reservation conflicts:

1. Click the link provided in the Conflicts Smart Folder.
2. Expand the Toolbar and click Resolve Conflict. The Resolve Port Reservation Conflict
dialog opens, showing the differences between the reserved and discovered information.
3. Choose from the following options:
○ Change the reserved port to be the same as the discovered port.
○ Keep the configured port reservation and clear the conflict for the next 1 day(s).
Note: In the Grid Discovery Properties → Advanced tab, the Ignore Conflict Duration
setting governs the default time duration to ignore (clear) certain types of conflicts that
may occur when defining IPAM objects that are associated with discovered and
managed devices, interfaces, or IP addresses. Increments can be defined in Hours or
Days.
4. Click OK to save changes.

Another category of conflicts involves incorrectly defined device information for the object:
● The reserved Device Type information provided is different from the discovered vendor and
device type (Router vs. Switch, for example).
● The defined Device Vendor information does not match with the discovered information.
● A User Port Reservation conflict occurs when an unmanaged IP address attempts to use a port
that is already reserved by an IPAM object on a different IP address.

You can choose from the following options:

● Change configured information to discovered information.
● Keep the current device configuration and clear the conflict for the next 1 day(s).

In virtually all cases, replacing the configured information with the discovered information successfully
clears the conflict; click OK to commit changes or to temporarily clear the conflict.

Resolving Multiple Conflicts

You can define objects for IP addresses, attempt to apply a port reservation, or incorrectly specify a
value such as a MAC address or a vendor name, and accidentally cause multiple conflicts after creating
the new object.

When multiple conflicts need to be resolved for a particular IP address, you use a Resolve Multiple
Conflicts wizard:
To quickly locate any conflicts, open the Smart Folders panel and open the Conflicts list.

Click the IP address for any entry in the Conflicts list. The IPAM page opens for the selected IP
address, with the top panel highlighted in pink to indicate the conflict.

Open the vertical toolbar and click Resolve Conflict.

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If multiple issues are involved with the conflict entry, the Resolve Conflicts wizard lists each of them as
shown in the screen shot below.

Select the conflict that you want to resolve first and click Next. For example, consider choosing to
resolve the MAC Address conflict as shown above. The second step of the wizard appears, listing the
differences between the Existing and Discovered information for the conflict as shown below.

In this case, the MAC address specified in the last fixed address object configuration, for that object,
conflicts with the discovered MAC address associated with the IP. (You can verify this by checking the
Related Objects tab in the IPAM page for the IP address.) Choose from one out of two options:
 Change the configured MAC address to be the same as the discovered MAC address;
 Keep fixed address and ignore this conflict for the next 1 day(s).

In this example, the Discovered information for the MAC address associated with the Fixed Address
object is one digit off from the Existing MAC information, which was entered incorrectly by the

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administrator. The discovered MAC, shown in red, is the correct value and should be used to overwrite
the record for the conflict.

Select the ‘Update... with discovered data’ option and click Resolve. The wizard updates with a return
to the first step, in which you select the next conflict to resolve. A banner shows the result of the first
resolution.

Select the next conflict to resolve and click Next. As an example, screen shot below shows a device
configuration conflict.

To resolve the conflict, the Configured information must be overwritten with the Discovered information:
○ Change configured device type and vendor to be the same as the discovered device
type and vendor;
○ Keep current device configuration and clear the conflict for the next 1 day(s). Other
conflict types have similar language.

Select from the above choices and click Resolve.

Continue through the wizard to resolve the last conflict associated with the IP address.

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