netTerrain Complaint of the Week: the upgrade patch won’t work!
By Jan Durnhofer - March 27, 2020As you may have seen from one of our newsletters or announcements, we just released version 8.5 of netTerrain . Since most of our customers have an on-premise installation, they’re pointed to download the new version of the software (I’m referring to customers that already use netTerrain and therefore have plenty of data related to…
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Need DCIM Software? 3 Questions to Ask First
By Fred Koh - March 25, 2020When we talk to organizations that are looking for a Data Center Infrastructure Management (DCIM) solution, we always ask this: are the pain and issues big enough to make the move? DCIM software, such as netTerrain DCIM,takes some time to implement and it’s an investment: moving to a DCIM software solution requires a commitment from…
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netTerrain 8.5: Fresh Look, New Features
By Jan Durnhofer - March 23, 2020This is the fourth, and perhaps the last, incarnation of the 8.x series. This time around, our engineering team worked on close to 300 tickets. Yes, 300! There were the usual small fixes and improvements, and also many tickets related to the Collector and the API, but, drum roll please: 8.5 also saw some major…
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Step Up to the Plate: Finally Time to Ditch Spreadsheets & Visio Diagrams?
By Fred Koh - March 20, 2020Step up to the plate and ditch the spreadsheets and Visio diagrams once and for all— no, I am not talking baseball here. So, what do I mean by step up to the plate? Ditching Visio Diagrams & Spreadsheets: Do You Have Pain? When we have initial discovery calls with organizations looking at netTerrain, we…
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netTerrain Settings: Fiber and Outside Plant Diagram Tuning
By Jan Durnhofer - March 17, 2020In our first blog in this series on settings for our outside plant software, we explained the need for settings in the context of fine tuning you Data Center, Network Documentation or Outside Plant project and we looked into a specific repository of parameters called Settings.xml. In our second blog in this series we looked…
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Press Button, Picture Network, Go to Sleep…?
By Jan Durnhofer - March 13, 2020If you work in IT, and you’ve spent more than 5 minutes trying to troubleshoot the network, you probably know the usual deal with network documentation . It’s very important and at the same time… it’s usually the last thing people update. In ‘Steady State’ mode, aka when no alarms are going off, you run…
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4 Ways Network Documentation Helps You Secure the Network
By Fred Koh - March 11, 2020In a recent article, I wrote about network documentation and diagrams — and why automation is the key to getting network diagrams up-to-date (and have them stay current). In that article, I didn’t address how proper and up-to-date network documentation is important for security aspects. Security? Now, I don’t mean documenting cameras, alarm boxes, fire…
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netTerrain Settings: Fine-tune netTerrain Notifications & Visualization Features
By Jan Durnhofer - March 5, 2020In the first blog in this series, we explained the need for settings in the context of fine tuning you Data Center, Network Documentation or Outside Plant project and we looked into a specific repository of parameters called Settings.xml. In this second blog, we will continue looking into specific settings that can help you fine…
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Where’s the Deployment Guide?
By Jan Durnhofer - March 3, 2020This week we opened a very interesting email from a potential customer who wanted to check out netTerrain’s deployment guide (they’re seriously considering deploying netTerrain DCIM for their Data Center Infrastructure Management needs). After providing this prospect with the installation guide, he came back requesting more documentation that would specifically address firewall rules. I thought…
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IT Visualization Software: “what can it do?”
By Fred Koh - February 27, 2020In one of my previous articles — about what netTerrain is — I discussed some of the items you can visualize in netTerrain. When doing demos for prospects, most people don’t know the full capabilities of our IT visualization software, netTerrain. It’s more than just a network documentation, DCIM, and fiber plant solution…it’s a web-based…
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Successful DCIM Implementations: Our Top Tips
By Fred Koh - February 24, 2020As the sales director for a DCIM/Outside Plant/Network Diagram software (netTerrain), I answer many questions each day. One of the most common questions I’m asked is, “well, how do we get started?” as well as, “If we decide to go ahead and use netTerrain, how can people get netTerrain up and running and get trained?”…
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Need to Migrate Away from netViz?
By Fred Koh - February 21, 2020Back in the early 1990’s, a company based in Gaithersburg, Maryland, offered a desktop-based, IT documentation system called netViz. netViz did what it did great. It gave users the ability to document networks, data centers, and enterprise architecture diagrams. Users were using netViz to document its data center racks and cables, well before the term…
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