Network Performance Tools

Much is in the news lately concerning advances in Carrier Ethernet technology. Network infrastructure build-out is continuing at a rapid pace on every continent, with some of the biggest growth taking place in the Middle East and Africa. In addition, domestic U.S. service provider infrastructure continues to grow as the insatiable consumer demand for more services such as video, apps and on-demand media content (at ever faster speeds) seems to know no bounds. For example, Light Reading has reported that Comcast will soon be rolling out their new Metro Ethernet service in over 20 major U.S. markets.

Business and governments are also growing their infrastructure at a dizzying pace. What a lot of people don't know is that technologies such as Ethernet and MPLS are also applicable for environments in enterprise and government as well as Service Providers. Because network bandwidth needs are growing at every level - from individuals using tablets and smartphones to increasingly robust Service Level Agreements (SLAs) at the carrier level - managing network change and unified communications is a more complex task than ever before.

Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) networks are an attractive alternative for providing Virtual Private Network (VPN) services to your customers. Deploying a variety of IP VPN services in a multi-vendor environment is still challenging, however. Configuring VPN appliances individually for each account limits the scope of services you can offer and the number of clients you can handle. To stay competitive, you must find a way to automate the configuration of VPNs so they can be deployed fast, while still guaranteeing configuration accuracy in order to attain the top VPN performance your customers demand.



The Redcell MPLS Infrastructure Management Solution is a flexible tool that allows you to deploy all types of MPLS-based IP VPN services including Layer 3, Layer 2, and VPLS. Redcell handles the entire lifecycle of VPN services from initial configuration and deployment to daily administration and maintenance, as well as availability and performance monitoring.

If you'd like to learn out more, please email us at info@doradosoftware.com or contact us through our web form.
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One of the things we're proud of at Dorado Software is our long history of creating OEM element management systems (EMS) for leading manufacturers.

The new NETGEAR ProSafe® Network Management System (NMS200) gives customers a way to discover, configure, monitor and manage all NETGEAR Layer 2 and Layer 3 switches on their network from a simple, single interface. The ProSafe® 24-port 10 GE Managed L2+ Switch (XSM7224S) provides 10 Gbps server performance and scalability across the network. The ProSafe Network Management System will be expanded in future releases to manage other NETGEAR products.



"Mid-sized firms are in an awkward position when it comes to the use of advanced technology," said Ray Boggs, vice president of Small/Medium Business Research at IDC. "They have large company needs without large company staff and budgets, yet they can no longer get by on the basic resources used by small businesses. Coordination of different IT components is a major challenge, with network communications, storage, and security all in need of alignment, especially as new cloud and hosted resources become more powerful and more affordable. Technology providers and their reseller partners have a real opportunity to help mid-sized firms enhance and coordinate their core technology to sharpen performance and productivity."

Over 18 million businesses worldwide have broken free of the limitations of traditional enterprise vendors and deployed NETGEAR networking, storage and security solutions. To date, NETGEAR has delivered more than 700 petabytes of storage, 120 million Ethernet ports and two million firewalls to businesses and its 36,000 partners worldwide.

ProSafe Network Management System (NMS200)

The new NETGEAR ProSafe Network Management System is designed specifically for IT managers who want a cohesive tool to manage the NETGEAR devices on their network. It's the first unified management platform that can provide customers control across NETGEAR switching, wireless, storage and security products on the network. Available in October, it will handle NETGEAR's managed switches. NETGEAR plans to extend in subsequent releases the management of NETGEAR's smart switches, wireless, storage and security products.

The new NMS200 provides monitoring and configuration functionality for improved ease-of-use. From the moment a business user sets it up, the software automatically discovers supported NETGEAR products and brings them online so their performance can be managed and monitored 24x7. It comes with a single, simple console for extensive visibility, granular control and seamless automation across an entire business network.

Service Providers are constantly looking for ways to speed delivery to market without compromising quality. Automation is the only way to effectively accomplish this task. Manual solutions and CLI are labor intensive and error prone which results in lost revenue and customer dissatisfaction.

A single system to automate repeatable processes not only makes the fulfillment process significantly quicker but also eliminates costly errors. But it can't stop there. Once services are deployed, customers frequently need to change their service. For example a customer may require more bandwidth, or a different configuration. Redcell allows service providers to react quickly and efficiently to these customer needs. The result is delivering services to the end user faster, and with higher level of quality. 

Let's take a look at a graphical representation of the Redcell solution for service fulfillment:

• Common interface across multiple services 
• Track associations between services & customers/subscribers or network resources through the CMDB 
• Unified Service Provisioning 
• Transaction Model 
• Auditing of All Service Transactions 
• Service Templates 
• Service Preview 
• Integration with Pools 
• Service Quick Views 
• Tools to extend existing services or model & rapidly deploy new services 

• Proactive device/service health monitoring 
• Service Diagnostics (OA&M) 
• Data Collection and associated formulas and metrics for collected data 
• Performance Dashboards 
• Prepackaged Monitors 

• MPLS L2 E-Line Circuits (Point-to-Point) 
• MPLS L2 E-LAN Services (Multipoint) 
• MPLS L3 E-LAN/E-Tree Services/IP VPNs R 
• Configuration – Change – OAM 
• Redcell Resource Management & Operations 

• Carrier Ethernet End-to-End Service (EVC)

• NNI Service 
• UNI Service 
• CPE Configuration, VLANs 

• MPLS Traffic Engineered LSPs (RSVP - TE) / TE Tunnels & Named Paths 

Today we're going to be talking Redcell. While comparisons are nice (and we ALWAYS encourage people who are considering network infrastructure management software to do comparisons!) it's also good to just straight-up answer the question: "Why should I consider buying this product??"

When it comes to mission-critical infrastructure - network or otherwise - the folks running it are necessarily and understandably risk-averse. We wouldn't want it any other way. After all, do we want people to consider sloppy network management solutions for our phone company or airline? At the same time, the quickly evolving nature today's networked world makes it impossible to simply ignore change. At Dorado Software, that's a big part of what we do - help our customers manage network infrastructure change.

Gone are the days of manually running all but the smallest IT networks using hardware from just 1 vendor. Instead, a must-do requirement of any network management or monitoring software should be to be able to manage more than 1 vendor. And to be able to deploy automated network management. We encourage you do do yourself a favor: Save yourself a drive down to the server rack at 2am!

Some of the biggest network concerns center around network security. Especially with prominent equipment vendors such as Cisco. Here are some examples of what Redcell has when it comes to security and fault management:
Regardless of what tool you use, these are functions your current network management software should be able to perform. We encourage you to check out Redcell.

How nice would it be to have 1 common interface... A single GUI, not a bunch of different tools... for everything?

One aspect of network management: Inventory/deep discovery. This is something that on the surface sounds simple, but really is the foundation for everything else that takes place in your network. For example, "How are my devices configured?" or "How are my services provisioned?" You can't begin to fix a system or process that's broken without knowing first what you have.

Discovery also happens to be something that Redcell is really good at. It helps to be able to find various open management interfaces (like SNMPv1/v2/v3, Telnet, SSH, HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, SFTP and SCP). And to be able to find subcomponents, supported management information bases (MIBs) and Ethernet link information. This provides you with access to vital, in-depth network and connectivity data.

Now you can proceed with inventory discovery, event management, advanced scheduling and extensive device configuration management. You can also access physical, geographical and logical topology, security management, group management and performance monitoring... all with 1 single tool, not a hodge-podge of tools that may not work well together.



Service Providers such as AT&T and Telekom Malaysia already know the power of Redcell. For the uninititated, you can receive a free demo to see for yourself - or go head-to-head in a scenario with Redcell vs. any competitor. Check out the platform that was recently selected by Etisilat to support services for their 100m+ customers.

If you work with an Enterprise or Government agency, you can try Redcell free of charge in a 14-day trial or even request an extended license from us. Companies like Boeing Advanced Systems use Redcell for infrastructure management.

Lastly, Manufacturers such as Dell trust Redcell. Dorado Software has a long history of creating OEM element management systems (EMS) for leading manufacturers. Our flexible approach can get you up and running in a matter of weeks and provides you with the ultimate branding potential.

At any time  - we invite you to check out the tools because we honestly believe they are the best tools on earth - especially for complex, next-generation networks. One thing we've seen time and time again: Power users get it.

Service Provider Demo  |  Enterprise 14-Day Trial

What to do if you're managing Cisco? The first thing to do is research the tools that are out there. Redcell Service Provider Solutions for Cisco provide an integrated network and service management for Cisco advanced technologies. They provide a solid foundation so you can build successful and scalable service offerings for next generation security, Ethernet, VPN and other services, delivering the level of service and range of options your customers expect. With visibility across the network and powerful management tools, Redcell enables you to guarantee availability and performance-and when service level agreements are not being met, Redcell alerts you to proactively solve problems before they impact end-users.

You can capitalize on your Cisco advanced technologies, such as network-based security services, MPLS VPNs, VRF-aware IPSec VPNs, virtual firewall services and more.

*  Service Policies - Centralized Service Allocation & Provisioning for
          o Service/Security Policies
          o Resource Classes
          o ACL
          o NAT/ PAT/ Static NAT
          o URL Filtering
          o Firewall Inspection/ context changes
          o IPSec/ ISAKMP VPNs/ GRE tunnels
          o Remote Access/ EZ-VPN

    * Security Service Provisioning
          o VRF-Aware IPSec Service Configuration
          o Virtual Firewall Service Configuration
          o VRF-Aware Service Interface (VASI)

    * OSS Integration & Web Portal
          o Web services, XML Data Format/SOAP Envelope, Web Services Description Languate (WSDL), API definition, Request/response semantics, Application authentication, SSL secure transmission

    * Support for Cisco
          o 7200/7301: IOS 12.4(4)T1
          o 7600/Cat6500: IOS 12.2(18)SXE4
          o GSR XR 12000: IOS-XR 3.5






















Service Providers can now get a unified Network-Based security service management solution for creating, provisioning, and managing VRF-Aware IPSec VPN and virtual Firewall Services on Cisco 7200/7301, Cisco7600 and Cisco 12k series. The management solution provisions site-to-site and remote access IPSec and GRE VPNs and supports configuration of both site-to-site Virtual Firewall and Internet Offload with URL Filtering.

Lastly, there is the the Cisco IP SLA solution from Dorado Software. Don't just look at your IP SLA data, use Redcell's Cisco IP SLA Monitor and start saving your IP SLA data. The Redcell Cisco IP SLA Monitor is an advanced monitoring tool that lets you quickly troubleshoot network issues with quick notifications, thresholding on metrics and flexible reporting.

In any event - if you're working with Cisco, Dorado Software has you covered!

The world is full of marketing talk. Any company can say they are a “leader”, “largest” or “most comprehensive”.

Marketing messages and logos pop up everywhere. IBM recreated their logo on an atomic scale and Rolling Rock generated buzz by suggesting they were going to imprint their logo on the moon. I stepped out of my car the other day to see advertisements on the paint stripes in the parking lot. Seriously, everywhere.

But the real marketing rubber hits the reality road in two words: Customer Success. A Customer Success Story proves the marketing talk and puts the money where the mouth is. The exchange rate between regular marketing copy to Customer Success copy is something like 100:1 (look it up, I dare you).

So it’s a good thing to see yet another Customer Success piece published by Dorado Software. This one covers the immediate benefits experienced by Etisalat - one of the largest telecommunications companies in the world and the leading operator in the Middle East and Africa.

Etisalat deployed Dorado Redcell in February of this year to manage their international VPN network and expansion of that network to new territories. The impact of Redcell on their platform proved immediate benefits including:

• Reduced OPEX by automating, simplifying operations
• Service and customer co‐relation helps identify which customer is affected and saves time in resolving issues
• MPLS services resource pooling helps control and ease service administration
• Reduces reliance on technical staff – End‐customer inputs simple data to provision complex services
• Provisions end‐to‐end services (set up, monitor) with no involvement from operational and engineering staff

Again, as proved in the plethora of Customer Success pieces on the Dorado downloads section, Redcell performs. From Etisalat to Telekom Malaysia, from California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) to British Telecom, enterprises worldwide are discovering the power that Redcell provides them.

To see a complete listing of Success Stories reflecting Dorado's ability with numerous solutions including service provisioning, SNMP tools and SLA monitoring, browse over here.

Problem! Service Providers lose millions of dollars annually because of poor processes during the provisioning process. 

The Dorado Software downloads section is a quality repository of solution notes, data sheets, white papers and podcasts that cover a wide variety of topics. From drill-down information regarding Dorado’s suite of network management tools to the latest information on LTE and 4G and enterprise network management, our downloads section contains some great reading.

Two of the white papers that we regularly refer to are titled “The Complete Network Assessment” and “The One-Hour Network Assessment”. These documents lay out a clear path on how an enterprise IT organization can quickly and effectively perform network assessments and provide subsequent reporting. Below is an excerpt form “The Complete Network Assessment”. To download the complete white papers, free of charge, follow this link.

“The only thing constant in the network world is change. The network is in place to
support mission-critical applications that are constantly being updated with needs for new protocols, services, or greater bandwidth. Network assessment is vital to the health of any network as well as a key tool in identifying underutilized or out-of-date resources. A complete network assessment can identify elements in your network that are in need of an upgrade or replacement and elements in your network that can fulfill service or growth needs. Network assessment could be an easy task if network elements were all from a single vendor, in a single room, and managed by the same person. The fact is, though, that this is seldom the case.”

We were just perusing the collection of white papers on the Dorado Software website  and ran across a great write-up regarding lights-out IT Management. If you haven’t seen the actual white paper, you can get it here.

In a nutshell, Lights-Out IT Management is the ability to provide automated remediation including event, configuration, service level and security management in an unattended environment. This helps move IT resources further up the food chain – being able to provide value-add services to the enterprise instead of maintaining the “status quo”.

Lights-Out IT Management also covers the trifecta of IT responsibilities:

• Find – Automatic discovery of all IT infrastructure elements
• Configure – Automatically configure a service and IT infrastructure elements – especially the rote configurations
• Monitor – Maintain a highly-intelligent infrastructure monitoring scheme including Network Availability Management and WAN monitoring.

When implementing Lights-Out IT Management, the major tactical benefits fall into these categories:

• Configuration Management – Reduce / eliminate manual configuration – especially rote configurations
• Event Management – Monitoring events for conditions that may lead to a fault. Proactively take remediation measures.
• Service Level Management – Ensure SLAs are being met and feed violations to a fault management component
• Security Management – Ensure security policies are not being violated.

By converting manual network tasks into automated routines, an IT department can move resources towards customer-facing services and create more value for the enterprise. Automated management tools should be able to handle these tasks:

• An integrated system that supports find, configure and monitor functions
• Support for customizable user interface
• Multi-vendor, multi-element, multi-domain support
• Service-level awareness and reporting
• Support for virtualized environments
• Support for physical and logical network topologies and root cause analysis
• Integrated functionality across the Fault, Configuration, Accounting, Performance, Security (FCAPS) model and Service Level Management
• The ability to assist in the rapid creation and/or modification of a service
• Support of a sophisticated CMDB
• A high degree of automation within each function and across functions
• Ease of integration with other network management tools

Of course, Dorado software is a prime candidate for these operations and can help an IT department realize improved efficiencies and higher levels of service.

A sampling of other white papers at the Dorado website:

Impact of Carrier Ethernet on Service Providers

The Complete Network Assessment

The One Hour Network Assessment

Dorado gets another mention by people in the know. This time it’s from SearchNetworking.com. In the current article on TechWatch, it explains how to choose and implement automated configuration management tools.

Especially interesting is how Dorado already meets the majority of the items needing consideration. Such as:

•  A successful closed loop configuration management tool (CLCM) includes detailed templates that perform the actions and specify a set of conditions that must be met. Check.
• Actions to be taken based on several conditions including, in the event of a failure, returning the network to previous configuration. Got that.
• Integration between configuration tools, fault management tools including auto discovery. With Dorado’s suite of network tools, all this can be handled from a single console.

We’re glad to see the increasing press on our line of network management, configuration, monitoring and asset inventory products. A great product deserves great press!