Once the Auvik collector is successfully installed on your network, it automatically searches on its local subnet to find more networks. When new networks are discovered, you can choose whether to have Auvik scan them or not.
Refining the topology
During the network scan, Auvik looks for network devices that expose the following information:
- ARP tables
- Forwarding tables (Layer 2)
- IP assignments
- VLAN associations
- Layer 1 discovery protocols, such as Link Layer Discovery Protocol (LLDP), Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP), and Foundry Discovery Protocol (FDP)
This information is pulled from SNMP through various management information bases (MIBs), and by issuing "show" commands through the CLI on network elements.
From there, Auvik uses logic to determine connections and model your network. Where definitive connection information is unavailable, the system uses a set of proprietary algorithms to infer the remaining connections.
On your map, you can see:
- Wired and wireless connections when we have strong evidence of a physical connection
- Inferred wired and inferred wireless connections when Auvik knows the connection must exist but doesn’t have the exact port mapping
For example, there may be an unmanaged switch between a router and a set of PCs. The system will realize this and add an unmanaged device to your map.
Refining Device Information
Once a device is discovered, Auvik looks for open services so it can identify the class of device, such as printer, switch, firewall, access point, laptop, or phone. The system uses a number of tools and services to refine device information. They include:
- SNMP v1/2c, and v3
- Generic credentials (public, private) are tried to identify the device using System-MIB
- SSH, Telnet, and CLI
- Multicast Domain Name System (mDNS)
- SMB / Samba
- Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI)