Network traffic and bandwidth control: Have you left any stones unturned?
You might be wondering what the old adage has to do with traffic or bandwidth. The answer is simple: IT teams monitor business critical applications and services with advanced traffic and bandwidth monitoring tools, but they don't keep track of the seemingly 'non-critical' components.
When performance bottlenecks arise, they may not always affect the critical systems that you do monitor.
Any application could hog valuable bandwidth unbeknownst to you, misconfigurations could disrupt network devices, and a host of other things like IP conflicts, unauthorized user activities, and un-optimized traffic usage could affect your applications and networks.
None of this can be detected if you're focusing your monitoring on the critical systems alone. Since the network itself is interconnected, only comprehensive visibility will yield complete control. With complete control, you can truly optimize your traffic and bandwidth usage.How can you leave no stones unturned?
You can start by extending your monitoring to more components of your network. Be it customer-facing or internal applications, conversations, media traffic, or IP addresses. If your applications are hosted on distributed sites, it's imperative that you monitor those networks as well. This will help you get a more complete picture of your network.
Here are five best practices that will help you gain more control over your network traffic and bandwidth.
Extend your monitoring to all bandwidth consuming interfaces: whether they are customer-facing or not
Prioritize traffic by blocking access for unwanted apps, users, or devices
Track other aspects of the network: Like configurations, IP addresses, and network packets
Monitor distributed sites from a centralized console