Now that UDT 1.0 is out the door, we have a whole slew of fun things we are working on to make it better! * User information from Active Directory * Better topology information (using CDP) to more accurately determine endpoint locations * Expanded schema for Alerts and Reports * More details about endpoints connected to wireless networks (this has been pushed for consideration in a release further in the future). * More integration between SolarWinds products (NPM and IPAM) * Bug fixes and other necessary enhancements PLEASE NOTE: We are working on these items based on this priority order, but this is NOT a commitment that all of these enhancements will make the next release. We are working on a number of other smaller features in parallel. If you have comments or questions on any of these items (e.g. how would it work?) or would like to be included in a preview demo, please let us know!

Couple of things I would like to see:

More control over the table that is shown when we search for IP's or MAC's. Currently, I can change the number of items per page, but the page only shows 10 items at a time, and is NOT sizeable.
Search by VLAN
PDF Export needs improvemets. Half the time I export a UDT search, I have items on screen, but the PDF is empty.
Add Export to Excel and/or direct Printer support.

Thank you.

Thanks for the feedback Don.

Are there any other enhancements to the search results page you would like to see? One ideas we are considering is adding the Port Discovery advanced options to the search results so people could parse through all of the available data easier (and add an option for VLAN).

On the PDF problems, I assume you are referring to the search results. Unfortunately, this is a limitation on the type of grid that is used and is a known issue. Most people can get the data they need by exporting to CSV. When you say export to Excel, does it make a big difference for you to be able to export to .XLS instead of CVS?

Mav

call me blind, but I dont have any option for exporting to a CSV. Just "Export to PDF" option that shows up on the search page. Is there some checkbox in the config I missed?

Donald_Francis

Mav this is a great list of things. As I had mentioned on Thwack before the potential for this module is great.

One thing I would like to see is something you mentioned somewhat on your list. If you are indeed going to use CDP, then why not take that just 1 step further and create another useful function.

How about creating a network map from the CDP and port/mac info? Not one to be pretty and flashy but a functional one. I often time have to crawl a network and go from switch to switch when troubleshooting just to verify what was documented.

But if I could pull up a site or subnet and see how they are connected that would be truly awesome. That would save tons of time across several different people here.

hankb

There seems to be a Cisco preference which is understandable since they dominate the Network switch market, but can we see the use of the standard based LLDP?

Cisco also supports LLDP so the use of LLDP will have a significant impact on dissimilar network infrastructures.

thx

Hank

Hank,

Great feedback!

For the first release of UDT we focused on HP and Cisco support. However, we tried to leverage industry standards where possible to get broader vendor support. I only mentioned CDP up there but LLDP is something we are also looking into. CDP is just slightly higher priority and I didn't want to offer a lot more than we can deliver :-)

Mav

We would like to see some better support for IPT devices, when we see a device in UDT it shows as not directly connected because it is connected to the internal switch on a Cisco IPT device therefore when searching for devices it brings back a number of different results because we can't lock it down to directly connected.

See great potential for this product, the inclusion of CDP is a must for us because it is taking too long to trawl through our larger Cisco switch stacks, hopefully CDP will speed up this process.

Jon,

There are some fixes available in an upcoming service release that should address the IPT issues. I'll make sure you get this when it is available.

Regarding discovery taking long, this is actually an issue with the Orion Core Discovery. They are trying to get this fixed for their next release. In the meantime, the UDT team is continuing to research better topology detection mechanisms (including CDP).

Mav

kluap

Reference expanded schema for alerts and reports, one key feature that is missing from the product IMHO is the ability to do something should a new MAC address be discovered e.g. raise an alert should a new device become visible to UDT. Hopefully, this can be included in the near future.

Thanks

nkorosi

Now that development has issues an "unofficial" update which adds support for Juniper EX series switches, I was finally able to evaluate the product. There were a few things that I think would be useful in the future:

1. I agree with Hank. CDP does nothing for me and while Cisco may still dominate the market, they are slowly on their way out. I think that embracing standards would be a huge advantage. LLDP support would help determine an endpoint on our network. Currently, any endpoint with an IP phone doesn't display as an endpoint.

2. If there was a way to tie into a MAC address vendor database, this would allow me to search for specific devices such as printers, Linksys/D-Link routers (rogue APs), and any other unauthorized devices that employees and guests may plug in.

3. We really NEED the ability to filter our searches using regular expressions! Our switch port names are formatted ge-0/0/1, ge-1/0/1, etc.

Just a few ideas...

Nick

how about an option to POLL all nodes for UDT at once, instead of manually having to pick each device? (settings/udt job status)

Hi Mav,

I would also like to see an ability to change ports to different VLAN's via a SNMP set. Also then to have granular control within UDT so that you can assign certain devices to users so they could perform this type of function.

I would also like to see the VLAN name being displayed alongside the VLAN number which allows engineers to identify the VLAN with ease if you have many VLANS configured.

I would also like to have a VLAN search facility addedd in the same place that you can search for MAC's and IP's.

I would also like to see a UDT search resource, so you can publish this on custom pages created for certain users that need to search for this type data.

I would also like to see more reports created for UDT that provide a list of connected endpoints, showing switch name, PC name, PC MAC, switch port, VLAN, VLAN name, switch port duplex, switch port speed, IP address of endpoint all in one line per entry.

I would like to add that UDT is a great product and has alot of potential

Cheers

James

James,

These are all great suggestions. Keep them coming!

We are planning on covering the reporting questions with the "Expanded schema for Alerts and reports" item in the above list.

Some of the VLAN items we are currently looking at (like searching for items in a VLAN), but the SNMP set for VLAN is definitely not going to make this release, but I've opened a case to track it. Having the name next to the number is also a great suggestion.

Mav

Mperor

One thing that I thought might make my life easier...

It would be nice to be able to sort by %ports used by "Switch Closet", or location, etc. (Which may already be possible? I haven't dug that deep).

One thing that would also be VERY useful (and probably much more difficult) would be to have the total number of ports per location, and total number of those ports that are PoE capable.

Along with that would be total number of active ports (used ports), and total number of those that are actually drawing power using PoE.

I often find myself having to remotely access each switch at a specific location. I'll find out how many of the ports are active, and how many of those are actually using power. Then total everything up to see if I need to purchase more hardware. Often I'll find that, with some juggling (from PoE to Non-PoE), I can avoid having to purchase another PoE switch. I try to buy standard switches when I can because they are considerably less expensive. Having that information "at a glance" or as an alert would save me some time and just be handy!

czajkaej

Can this be done currently?

I want to generate a report that shows all of my network interfaces, and show the date the port was last used. I have NPM, NCM, UDT, NTA, and APM.

Thanks
Ed

Nice request. We can view that data when we manually run the switchport mapper, so it would be a good addition to UDT!

Hi Mav,

After running with UDT for a while now I have some more requests.

1: Add the InterfaceLastChange date timestamp to UDT, so we can see when a port last changed its status

This would be useful when creating reports to show which ports have not changed status used on a particular switch for a period of time and you could correlate this against the admin status and oper status.

UDT table to add this too:

UDT_Port

2: Create some historical tables where UDT takes a snap shot of the port data for each switch/device that it manages and keeps it for a period of time defined by the user via the web interface, so some trending on this data can be doen via report writer.

Thanks

James