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I have just set up a wonderful new transparent bridge/firewall and am looking for suggestions on good additions to my networking toolbelt. Running FreeBSD on a brnad new little server with a 40GB HDD, 256MB Ram for a dozen web/mail/ftp servers.<br />
<br />
I am pretty impressed with one particular thing I found - iftop - (for the first time ever I see what is happening on the network) and realized there is probably a whole world opening up to me in the FreeBSD CLI world.<br />
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What other &quot;critical networking tools&quot; do you guys swear by?<br />
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Please comment on the following, which I have never used, but see a lot of press about;<br />
<br />
1) BandwidthD<br />
2) Snort (and related additions?) / Hogwash<br />
3) MRTG<br />
4) ntop<br />
<br />
If you can give me a &quot;programs you can't live without&quot; list for managing a network, that would be swell. Think bandwidth monitoring, bandwith limiting, intrusion detection, etc.<br />
<br />
Any suggestions are welcome...
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I have just set up a wonderful new transparent bridge/firewall and am looking for suggestions on good additions to my networking toolbelt. Running FreeBSD on a brnad new little server with a 40GB HDD, 256MB Ram for a dozen web/mail/ftp servers.

I am pretty impressed with one particular thing I found - iftop - (for the first time ever I see what is happening on the network) and realized there is probably a whole world opening up to me in the FreeBSD CLI world.

What other "critical networking tools" do you guys swear by?

Please comment on the following, which I have never used, but see a lot of press about;

1) BandwidthD
2) Snort (and related additions?) / Hogwash
3) MRTG
4) ntop

If you can give me a "programs you can't live without" list for managing a network, that would be swell. Think bandwidth monitoring, bandwith limiting, intrusion detection, etc.

Any suggestions are welcome...

Network Management Suggestions

Network analysis is the process of identifying and remediating the processes and systems within a network, including performance, connectivity and security. The process is performed through the use of tools developed for monitoring and analyzing network activity. Network problems that involve finding an optimal way of doing something are studied under the name combinatorial optimization. Examples include network flow, shortest path problem, transport problem, transshipment problem, location problem, matching problem, assignment problem, packing problem, routing problem, Critical Path Analysis and PERT (Program Evaluation & Review Technique).

Network Analysis

A switch is a device that filters and forwards packets of data between LAN segments. Switches operate at the data link layer or the network layer of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) Reference Model and therefore support any packet protocol. LANs that use switches to join segments are called switched LANs or, in the case of Ethernet networks, switched Ethernet LANs. A hub is a connection point for devices in a network. Hubs are commonly used to connect segments of a LAN. A hub contains multiple ports; when a packet arrives at one port, it is copied to the other ports so that all segments of the LAN can see all packets.

Switches / Hubs

Networking is the process of connecting computing devices, peripherals and terminals together through a system that uses wiring, cabling or radio waves that enable their users to communicate, share information and interact over distances. Often associated are issues regarding operating systems, hardware and equipment, cloud and virtual networking, protocols, architecture, storage and management.