Network management system having a network including virtual networks

Abstract

A network management system for managing a computer network in which media switching type infrastructures and media sharing type infrastructures are combined coexistently includes a database destined for network management in which correspondences established among information concerning physical interconnections of individual equipment on the network, information concerning logical network configuration such as that of virtual network, and information concerning the users who make use of the network are stored, identifying means for identification of the individual equipment on the network and physical addresses intrinsic to network ports, respectively, and retrieval means for searching information of the physical addresses of the network ports with queries for the logical addresses.

Description

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION [0001] The present invention relates to a network management technique suited advantageously for employment in a network in which media sharing type infrastructures and media switch type infrastructures coexist mixedly. [0002] Heretofore, a router apparatus and a bridge apparatus have been widely used as the means for controlling communication traffics by dividing a network into a plurality of segments. Further, a high-speed / wide-band switch apparatus of ATM type (Asynchronous Transfer Mode) has also been developed and used for practical applications. As is stated in a draft of “IEEE 802.1q Standards” published by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 130421 / 1997 (JP-A-9-130421) as well, it is known to implement virtual networks, i.e., logical network segments for every network port under the control of the switch apparatus. However, there exist a plurality of s...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0013] In the light of the state of the art described above, it is an object of the present invention to provide a network management technique which is capable of managing easily a network system which includes a plurality of virtual networks realized in accordance with different schemes.

[0019] With the arrangement of the network management system mentioned above, management of the network including a plurality of virtual networks realized in accordance with respective schemes can be facilitated because the setup status of the virtual networks can be referenced, surveyed or altered easily in a consolidated manner owing to the provision of the service-destined database which is capable of storing the information concerning the physical interconnections of network equipment, the information concerning the logical virtual network configuration and the user information.

Problems solved by technology

The conventional systems or schemes mentioned above, however, suffer problems such as enumerated below.

In that case, however, much difficulty is encountered in referencing or surveying the network configuration as a whole over a wide range and altering or modifying the same.

More particularly, because no consideration is paid to the structure of a database destined for consolidative management for the setup status and supervision of the whole virtual network realized by a plurality of equipment, it is extremely difficult in referencing or supervising and altering or modifying the setup status of the virtual network configuration and the network address structure over a plurality of machines or equipment.

In other words, when a plurality of virtual networks of different types are combined coexistently, an extreme difficulty will be encountered in managing the network as a whole while referencing or altering the setup statuses of the virtual networks in a consolidated manner at one location or station.

In such network system, it is impossible to grasp intuitively the physical equipment interconnections as well as relations with and among the logical network configurations.

Consequently, when occurrence of obstacle or failure in the network system is detected, extreme difficulty will be involved in determining discriminatively the location where the failure or disturbance is taking place.

As will now be appreciated from the foregoing, with the conventional techniques, it is very difficult to realize a means which allows a person in charge of managing or supervising the network system to grasp intuitively the configuration or structure of the network system as a whole by establishing or grasping simultaneously correspondences among the logical network segment structures implemented as the virtual networks, the physical network configuration realized by physically wiring the equipment, and the logical network configuration as viewed from the standpoint of higher-rank protocols of variety.

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