[opennms-discuss] OpenNMS as an "umbrella NMS" / "integrated network management system"

[Tim Mew]

Hi everyone



I am looking at the possibility of using OpenNMS as an "umbrella NMS"/
"integrated network management system" for multi-vendor/multi-technology
enterprise networks.



The target size of these networks would typically be 200-500 nodes, but
consist of say up to 10 different technologies from different vendors, eg
Cisco LAN/WAN, microwave radio from vendor A, SONET from vendor B, LMR from
vendor C, digital I/O alarms, etc, etc. Each type of equipment would
typically come with their own "element management system" and/or (if they
don't natively support SNMPO) adaptors to SNMP.



What I am looking for is something like OpenNMS to act as an umbrella NMS to
integrate northbound alarms from the various element management systems
and/or SNMP adaptors.



If anyone has experience in deploying OpenNMS in such an architecture, I
would greatly appreciate any comments / feedback about your experience.



Does it perform this type of role well?



To what extent does it perform typical functions of umbrella NMSs such as
correlation and filtration of alarms, and does it perform them well?



Thanks

Tim

[Jeff Gehlbach]

I am looking at the possibility of using OpenNMS as an $B!H(Bumbrella
NMS$B!I(B/ $B!H(Bintegrated network management system$B!I(B for multi-vendor/multi-
technology enterprise networks.
The target size of these networks would typically be 200-500 nodes,
but consist of say up to 10 different technologies from different
vendors, eg Cisco LAN/WAN, microwave radio from vendor A, SONET from
vendor B, LMR from vendor C, digital I/O alarms, etc, etc. Each type
of equipment would typically come with their own $B!H(Belement management
system$B!I(B and/or (if they don$B!G(Bt natively support SNMPO) adaptors to
SNMP.

OpenNMS has the flexibility to perform very well in this role. The
limiting factor is likely to be the quality of interfaces supported by
your EMSes. We have a facility called the Model Importer that allows
OpenNMS to take some or all parts of its view of the managed world
from an external provisioning system or EMS. You can see an example
application of this facility in the Provisioning Groups feature in the
web UI of OpenNMS 1.3.x and later.

To what extent does it perform typical functions of umbrella NMSs
such as correlation and filtration of alarms, and does it perform
them well?

Event and alarm correlation is supported in OpenNMS by a pluggable
correlation engine framework. OpenNMS ships with Drools as an example
engine. There is also an Event Translator facility that enables rule-
based transmogrification of events into other types of events and
(re)assignment of events to nodes, which is likely to be critical when
receiving northbound events. In case some of the component EMSes do
not perform event de-duplication, or if you require additional
reduction, you can configure Netcool-style event reduction in
OpenNMS. Once the alarms are in the system, you can configure
escalations to do interesting things with them.

Another feature that you did not mention, but that might help in your
decision, is the trouble ticketing API that we added to OpenNMS last
year. Designed to be triggered either as part of the operator-driven
alarms workflow or from automations, it enables the bidirectional
creation, updating, and resolution of tickets in an external help desk
system.

I hope this helps. Let us know if you need more detailed information
on any point.

Best,
- -jeff

- --
Jeff Gehlbach
The OpenNMS Group, Inc. | http://opennms.org/ | http://opennms.com/