What is FCAPS?
Successful businesses rely heavily on their network infrastructure to keep up with demand and to allow work to flow smoothly. When outages occur, whole operations can come to a standstill which equates to wasted time & money, and most importantly, unhappy customers. As networks continue to grow and become more complex, so does the amount of effort and resources needed to keep them running at optimal efficiency. The goal is to migrate away from a reactive form of management and move to a proactive approach that can allow administrators to identify and correct issues before they become problems.
Industry leaders are constantly searching for enterprise grade tools and solutions that allow them to take more control of their infrastructure, and the best of them follow the FCAPS model and framework for network management.
FCAPS is the ISO Telecommunications Management Network model and framework for network management. The term itself is an acronym for the five areas of function within the model:
ZPE’s Nodegrid solutions consolidate and virtualize all your network functions onto one platform, no matter which vendors you use. Nodegrid makes it easy for you to monitor, configure, administer and secure your network from one centralized location while also providing you with the metrics and data you need to make smarter business decisions. Of course, Nodegrid meets all aspects of the FCAPS framework.
Fault Management
Network faults happen, so catching them before they can cause serious issues is critical. The ability to identify, isolate, log, and correct them is a necessary component to every network. Further, the ability to review historical fault data in order to identify trends allows you to take proactive measures that can greatly improve network stability.
Nodegrid’s tracking features provide information about the system and connected devices such as Open Sessions, Routing Table, System Usage, Discovery Logs, LLDP and Serial Statistics. The Event List feature provides statistical information on all system events occurrences which can help you to quickly visualize your data.
Configuration
Configuration management plays a substantial role within your network. From deployments to upkeep, everything must be centralized and tracked in order to keep everything running smoothly. For optimal ease of use, a great system should:
- Centralized storage of configurations
- Simplify device configurations and provisioning
- Track changes
- Allow for future expansion
Nodegrid makes managing and configuring devices simple and easy. With Zero Touch Provisioning (ZTP), deploying new devices while maintaining consistency and reducing errors is a snap. Nodegrid can even leverage the existing ZTP features of your infrastructure and extend ZTP to other appliances, including those that don’t come with ZTP features. Nodegrid’s Auditing tool allows you to track everything from one location, ensuring that nothing gets lost in the shuffle.
Administration
Administration allows you to configure users and groups based on permissions allocated to them within the systems. Access should be restricted to ensure that only authorized users can make significant changes to critical systems.
Nodegrid offers you the ability to create various groups and users with specific permissions to meet your needs. More specific profile settings can also be configured, such as sudo permissions, custom session timeouts, and default startup applications.
Performance Management
Ensuring that network performance is consistently operating within optimal levels is another key aspect to successful network management. Tools should be available that allow you to monitor performance and troubleshoot issues while being easy to access and use on a regular basis. Data should also be readily accessible to allow for the identification of trends which can assist with future planning.
Nodegrid offers a dashboard tool to visually see Event Details, Managed Device details, and Monitoring Data from the system and all Managed Devices. It gives you the flexibility to create several dashboards for different purposes and monitor data points such as Power Consumption, Voltage (V), Current (A), Temperature, Fan speed, and many more. It provides options to show data from a different period of times such as the last 15 minutes, the last hour, the last day, this week, this month, or the last 5 years. Nodegrid also offers a full suite of Network Tools which allow you to run various tests in real time.
Security Management
Security management is all about limiting and controlling access to assets located within the network. User authentication, ACLs, and encryption all add layers to secure your network against threats and malicious attacks.
Nodegrid offers a robust security suite to ensure that your network stays secure. From a built-in firewall, customizable users and groups, configurable password complexity and expiration, as well as standard SSH and SSL protocols, you are in full control. Nodegrid offers the option to use 2-factor authentication for an extra layer of security. Single Sign-On (SSO) is also available and can be used with Duo, Okta, G Suite, or other custom SAML Identity Providers.