Tools for VoIP planning, monitoring and management

Whether you're planning for a VoIP or video networking deployment (or other services where quality of service issues can impose significant requirements), or simply charged with managing such networks, access to proper tools can support such efforts.

That's where products from well-known monitoring, scanning and management vendor

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NetIQ can really come in handy. The company offers a variety of tools and bundles that can help IT professionals prepare for and handle VoIP with ease and facility. These include the following:

  • Chariot: Generates application layer traffic that models real-time voice and video applications to measure and predict performance and help address QoS concerns.
  • Vivinet Assessor: examines existing networks to determine their ability to handle VoIP traffic. Includes metrics for capacity, performance, and call quality, plus a network inventory that can address current device and infrastructure issues, planning and predictive modeling tools, and comprehensive reporting tools.
  • Vivinet Diagnostics: helps to identify and investigate call quality problems in VoIP networks, and addresses potential causes for reduced call quality.
  • Vivinet Manager Suite: includes all the aforementioned tools plus additional monitoring and reporting capabilities to provide a single, comprehensive console which can plan for, model, manage, and troubleshoot VoIP networks.

Of course, NetIQ is just one of many vendors who offer general-purpose VoIP management and monitoring solutions (not to mention other built-in or add-on tools for VoIP systems from vendors like Avaya, Cisco, and others). Other interesting offerings are available from:

Among many others. With the right tools in hand, savvy network managers can more easily plan and prepare for VoIP prior to its deployment, and monitor, manage, and troubleshoot VoIP more effectively once it's in use.

Ed Tittel is a regular contributor to numerous TechTarget Web sites, and the author of over 100 books on a wide range of computing subjects from markup languages to information security. He's also a contributing editor for Certification Magazine, and series editor for Que Publising's Exam Cram 2 series of cert prep books. E-mail Ed at etittel@techtarget.com.


This was first published in March 2004

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