Enterprise network across the world are always looking for the easiest ways to manage their networks with a more automated process that can assist network administrators with troubleshooting and maintaining these networks. As a whole network management tools are a huge benefit to these networks and consist of five essential categories that are a must have across the board. The standard is called FCAPS which stands for: Fault, Configuration, Accounting, Performance, and Security.

Fault management is one of the most essential parts of a network management tool. The purpose of the Fault Management tool is to find and repair any faults that occur within a network. It has the ability to alert to critical alerts and monitor various servers within the network. This management tool continuously checks CCM servers, unity/exchange servers as well as ensuring that they are backed up completely. Fault management also provides an overview or topology of the network to show what is running smoothly and where active faults are occurring.

Configuration is essentially the way that the management software and devices are setup. Configuration will ensure that the network administrators get the alerts they want to see, setup auto fault alerts and ensuring that they can be automatically repaired if possible. Configuration is an essential part of a network management tool and allows customization for network administrators to operate the tools the way they need to for the company needs.

The accounting piece of a network management tool is basically the statistics of the network. Accounting can keep track of call detail records both historical and real time, call volume, peak usage, IP traffic, streams and more. This is an essential tool for a network administrator to utilize as this data becomes relevant to how the network needs to be adjusted. If there are devices that are not getting enough bandwidth where needed a network administrator is able to pull this data from the accounting section and make the necessary changes so that each device is allocated the right amount of bandwidth.

Performance is all important in many different aspects from the device itself to the network the device is running on. Without knowing the performance of the network we have no way to determine where things might be getting held up or failing within the network. With a performance option within the network management tool system we are able to view real-time data and traffic reports, we are able to view CPU utilization, latency, jitter, packet loss and more. It will also allow us to run QoS reports that may show any drops such as within a VOIP call.

The last piece of the network management tooling system is Security. Security is one of the most important pieces of network management. Security ensures that we are keeping the unwanted guests out of our network and to make sure that the packets being processed through the network are genuine and clean. This also allows us to configure a firewall and make sure that the firewall has not been breached in any way shape or form. If there is any hole within the network than the Security tool should find it and alert a network administrator. Without a security management tool networks across the world would run into many issues of hackers and information being leaked.

In conclusion all five of the FCAPS pieces are a necessity to make a network a well-oiled machine. Any of the above pieces that are not included can leave a network vulnerable, or at the very least not kept up with as it puts strain on administrators.