Proactively Visualize, Manage, Plan and Deploy Next Gen Data Centers with Rack View UI
The Washington release of Telecom Network Inventory (TNI) introduced the capability to not only visualize the Data Center Racks but helps manage the entire hardware lifecycle to help proactively maintain which reducing costly changes and remove obsolete hardware. Managing a datacenter requires the visibility so that an operator knows exactly the assets maintained in each location. With the rack visualization capability that TNI provides, the following capabilities are enabled:
- Rack visualization capability with Rack Unit utilization providing rack capacity availability within the UI
- Capability of instantiating new racks through a change request at every data center location in a network.
- Simplicity in having out of the box templates to add additional equipment to an existing rack unit via a change request.
- Easily using a change requrest to remove decommissioned equipment form a rack unit with out of the box templates.
- Enables the capability to create a Rack template and related templates
- Automatically create rack units based on their existing relationship model.
- Define a number of rack units (RU) against a single rack via model relationships.
The following diagram describes some key benefits in having an inventory system with a Rack View UI.
Datacenter Visibility: Visualize hardware across the network at all datacenter sites: from the cell site, Edge DC, Local data center (LDC), Regional Data center (RDC) and national data center (NDC).
Faster MTTR: Troubleshoot and remediate issues faster by identifying faulty hardware.
Improved Planning: Rack visualization enables the simplicity of rack capacity visible from the UI.
Asset Tracking: Out of the Box templates to instantiate, remove and create rack inventories with a few clicks. This enables complete hardware lifecycle management.
The following sections describe the detailed implementation of the rack view within TNI.
Implementing Rack View Within TNI
- To see the Rack View navigate to the Telecom Network Inventory Workspace
- From the List Menu, under Inventory > Equipment Holders, you can click on the Specific Class Filter for Show Matching and Select > Equipment Rack
- This will list all the equipment racks that are created
Click on a specific Equipment Holder, in this Case > Demo/Rack/48/1 which will display the rack view below which is the default layout. The following are descriptions of the clickable links (which can further describe the located on the right hand side of the UI:
- Rack Utilization is monitored and displayed on the left hand side (In this example 40% utilization) which indicates that 19 out of 48 RU are being utilized at the moment
The Maximum contiguous available RUs is also displayed
- Pending Change KPI on the right hand side refers to any open change of a CI of this particular rack
- Equipment Types provides a summary of all the different types of equipment that have been installed. This will help to identify the type equipment installed and can be beneficial in planning and optimization exercises.
- Default View: Front and Rear View are the default views that can be seen in the middle section below.
If the installed equipment takes up the entire RU slot, then it will be displayed as such in the UI (i.e. it will be displayed in both the Front and the Rear UI)
Rack space can also be reserved by users and will be displayed as reserved
- In the below, you can see that the equipment in Racks 20-22 are occupying only half rack space
- The naming convention also indicates the number of rack units (RU) that the hardware is used.
- If a shelf unit is required to be installed, it will also be indicated in the naming convention that a shelf was installed within the Rack as seen below.
- Also the naming convention also indicates the number of equipment installed as part of the naming convention.
- Related Information is displayed on the right hand side of the UI which inidicates the Site Name, Manufacturer of the equipment, post type, Dimensions, Total capacity, Asset Tag, Serial Number, warranty expiration, and Support Group. Some of this information is made available either through the model or the CI.
- If you click on each of the installed hardware in the rack view, the related information on the right hand side also gets refreshed with the relevant information for that particular hardware.
- If there are multiple equipments in a specific RU then the related information of all equipment equipment types will be made available by clicking on the Rack view
- You can Navigate by clicking on the 3 dots on the right hand side of the related information – Click on Actions > View Details
- This will take you to that particular equipment overview page where all the details of that particular equipment are displayed like all the slot details that you can click into to see the ports etc.
- Back to the overview page, there are additional tabs where information about the rack can also be found. For instance on there is Details tab, Change requests, Teams and Packs are all displayed on the same page
- By clicking on the building block on the right hand side, all the related infrastructure releationship will be displayed.
- The Information Pane can be removed by clicking on the “i” icon on the right hand side. By default this part of the pane will be expanded
Implementing Rack Model within TNI
Rack models have been introduced within TNI Washington release
- To view the rack models click on the List View > Inventory Models > Equipment Models
- Clicking on an example rack Model, there is the Name, Manufacturer information etc
- When creating an equipment Rack model, the Model Category must be Equipment Rack
- The Equipment Rack Model determines if the particular equipment holder is a rack model.
- Additional information can be added, for instance the dimensions of the rack as an example. Then click on SAVE:
- In the network model relationship, the rack slot will be defined.
- If you double click on the rack slot above, then below details will be displayed
Modelling a Rack
- From List > Inventory Models > Equipment Holder click on New at the top right hand corner
- The Following Form can be completed as follows:
- Manufacturer: CISCO
- Name: Generic Router Rack 12 RU
- Model Categories: Equipment RACK
- Dimensions: Select Inches
- Width: 8
- Height: 9
- Depth: 11
- Post Type: 4 Post
- Then click on SAVE
Once it is saved, the equipment model is created.
- The next step is to indicate how many RUs (Rack Units) the new equipment supports.
- Click on Network Model Relationships
- Click on NEW in the top right hand corner
Fill in the form Create New Network Model Relationship with the following information
-
- Name:
- Parent Product Model: CISCO Generic Router Rack 12 RU
- Relationship Type: Rack to slot
- Child product model: Rack Slot (Note that a new model can be created if a different name is required)
- Sequence: 1
- Then click on SAVE
- Return to the previous screen and refresh
NEW PICTURE NEDDED
- An inventory template needs to be created. Lists > Network Inventory Template > Inventory Templates > NEW
- In the template complete the following:
- Name: Cisco Router Rack Template
- Inventory Model: Cisco Generic Router Rack 12 RU
- Click on SAVE
- This will have created a new rack with 16 RU
- When clicking on the related templates, the CISCO router rack templates can be seen with the 16 RUs
- New naming pattern can be selected or modified
- Additional hierarchy can be defined for the rack
- Click on RU-1 above
- Once on that table further click on Related templates tab
- Click on New
- Complete the form as follows:
- Name: ASR1006 relation
- Inventory Model: Cisco ASR1006 (Click on the “i” to find out the number of RUs Needed)
- Relationship type: Contains::Contained BY
- Inventory template: Cisco AS1006 Template
- Parent: RU-1
- Slot Span: RU-2, RU-3, RU-4, RU-5, RU-6 (Plus the RU-1 makes 6 RUs)
- Click on SAVE
- Return to the original screen: Cisco Router Rack Templates
- An additional column of slot span can be added by clicking on the gear
- The additional slot span is now added and the process continues to add additional equipment to the rack
Instantiating a Rack Template at a Specific Location
Once the rack templates have been created, they can now be instantiated at a specific location or site. In order to do this chance, from lists navigate to > Changes > All and select NEW
There is a new out of the box template “Create RACK” available and can now be selected
- Select SAVE when the template appears
- Once the template is Saved, the tab Change Task appears
- Click on the Change Task tab and then click on the Task Number
- Once the Task Number is selected, it will display the Rack Attributes
- Complete the following:
- Name: Frankfurt POP
- Rack Template: Cisco Router Rack Templates
- Click on Submit
- Under Inventory > Equipment Holders the new rack will be available: FRNFTEELC11/Generic Router Rack 12 RU / 0
- Click on the newly created Rack
- The different equipment that were previously configured can now be seen in the UI Rack View below.
- As an example, the RU-16 needs to be reserved
- Click on the 16 RU in the UI and the following form will appear
- Life Cycle Stage: Deploy
- Life Cycle Stage Status: Reserved
- Managed By: Jake Maroli
- Click on SAVE
- Click on the 16 RU in the UI and the following form will appear
- The UI now reflects this change:
Adding Equipment Via Change Model
In order to do this change, from lists navigate to > Changes > All and select NEW
There is a new out of the box template “Add Equipment RACK” available and can now be selected
- Select SAVE when the template appears
- Once the template is Saved, the tab Change Task appears
- Click on the Change Task tab and then click on the Task Number
- Once the Change Task is selected, it will display the Rack Attributes
- Complete the following:
- Name: Frankfurt POP
- Rack Template: FRNFTEELC11/Generic Router Rack 12 RU / 0
- Equipment: OLT S/7360 Fx-4/2
- Available Rack Units: RU-7, RU-8
- Front View: Yes
- Exclusively Used: Yes
- Click on Submit
- Return to original Rack and refresh it, the new RU will have been added
Removing Equipment Via Change Model
In order to do this change, from lists navigate to > Changes > All and select NEW
There is a new out of the box template “Remove Equipment/Shelf from RACK” available and can now be selected
- Click on Next
- Select SAVE when the template appears
- Once the template is Saved, the tab Change Task appears
- Click on the Change Task tab and then click on the Task Number
- Once the Change Task is selected, it will display the Remove equipment or Shelf from Rack Attributes
- Complete the following:
- Name: Frankfurt POP
- Rack Template: FRNFTEELC11/Generic Router Rack 12 RU / 0
- Will display all the racks at the Frankfurt POP
- Equipment / Shelf: FRNFTELC1/ASR1006/2
- Will display all the equipment on the Rack Selected above
- Can also remove more than one equipment at a time
- Click on Submit
- Click on SAVE
- Return to original Rack and refresh it, the RU will have been removed.
- Can also see 2 Change request. Click on the change requests to see the ongoing change requests seen below:
