Auvik deployment strategies

There are three steps in planning an Auvik deployment:

1. Decide on the site relationship
2. Decide on the collector distribution
3. Decide on the collector type 

Site relationship

The first step is to decide how to map an organization in Auvik. Auvik gives you the option to logically segment an organization into manageable chunks through additional levels of hierarchy.

Auvik supports two types of site relationships:

• Site is a single location whose network you manage. 
• Multi-site is used to group sites. This is useful when an organization has multiple locations you manage. An organization can represent a separate company, a business division, or a region within the company with multiple locations.

You should use the multi-site when you have multiple geographic locations that are fairly large, or you have one large campus-style network with multiple buildings.

                   

 

Collector distribution

The next step is to decide how you want to set up your collector distribution in respect to Auvik sites. The Auvik collector is a lightweight data collector and remote management proxy for your networks. There are three main collector distribution types: 

1. One collector per Auvik site
2. One collector monitoring multiple Auvik sites (we refer to this as a shared collector)
3. Multiple collectors per Auvik site

One collector per site

The majority of Auvik deployments map an organization to a single Auvik site and have one collector dedicated to the Auvik site that resides physically at the location. It’s effectively a one-to-one relationship between Auvik sites and collectors.

A one-to-one relationship between Auvik sites and Auvik collectors works for the majority of cases, where each Auvik site: 

• Represents a single physical location 
• Has a relatively open network where every subnet can talk to each other
• Doesn’t need a failover collector
• And has a device available on-location where the collector can be installed

If any one of these conditions isn’t true, you may want to implement a different collector distribution type for one or all of your Auvik sites.

If this explains your scenario, see What installation options are available?

One collector monitoring multiple sites

If you have a set of locations that are small, relatively simple, and close geographically, it may be best to implement a shared collector. A shared collector is when one Auvik collector monitors more than one Auvik site. The shared collector must be able to reach each network that you’d like to monitor. See How do I manage my shared collector? for details.

Multiple collectors per site

The third type of collector distribution is to have multiple collectors per Auvik site. You may want to do this for a few different reasons:

1. You want a failover collector that will take over scanning the network if the primary collector goes offline.
2. You have multiple subnets kept separated for security reasons, like a subnet dedicated to connecting physical security equipment. 
3. You have an organization that’s too small to warrant a Auvik multi-site setup, but has two physical locations that aren’t connected by VPN (i.e., network segments that you can’t route between). In this case, implementing a collector at each physical location allows you to monitor both locations in the same Auvik site.

See Managing multiple collectors for more information.

Choosing a collector distribution type

The following series of questions can help you decide which collector distribution to use for the organization.

1. Is a failover needed?
• If yes, you’ll need to have multiple collectors per Auvik site.
• If no, proceed to the next question.
2. Can the Auvik collector be installed on an existing or new on-premise device?
• If no, use a shared collector. If yes, proceed to the next question.
3. How many locations do you need to monitor for the organization?
• One large, campus style location: Set up the organization as a multi-site with a shared collector onsite.
• One small- to mid-sized location: Use one collector and one Auvik site. If you have network segments you can’t route between, you’ll need to deploy a collector for each siloed network segment.
• If there’s multiple locations, proceed to the next question.
4. How geographically dispersed are the locations you need to monitor for the organization?
• If the locations are geographically diverse and latency is likely to be a concern, or if they are large locations you’ll want to set it up as a multi-site using multiple collectors, use one collector at each location.
• If the locations are close, and are small- to mid-sized locations, set them up as a single Auvik site with more than one collector. If you have network segments you can’t route between, you’ll need to deploy a collector for each siloed network segment.

• Note: You can change your collector distribution at any time. This doesn’t affect your Auvik subscription because all Auvik subscriptions include an unlimited number of collectors.

Collector type

See What installation options are available? for details.

If you have any questions about your deployment strategy, please contact Auvik support.