Benchmarking your network- 101

Benchmarking is a way to establish acceptable statistics or values

which represent your network levels as working within your tested
norms. Just like the doctor knows that if your temperature is to0 high
or low that it means that there has been an unacceptable change in
your physiology and he should look for reasons and treat accordingly.
Just like the doctor has blood pressure, pulse rate, respiration rate,
lung sounds and many more methods to evaluate your health, a
network manager should have parameters, statistics or other value
references to quickly evaluate the health and success of the network.
Some use the OSI stack for consideration and layer differentiation and
others use the TCP/IP stack for differentiation. It really does not matter
as long as you get definitive and comparative results. The graphic
below shows the OSI model compared to the TCP/IP stack and
associated protocols all the way up to the Application layers. The
reason for a network is the Applications The Business reason for
having a network!


The first level to consider is the physical layer or transport layer. To
evaluate this level you must have a promiscuous nic card for the layer
you are reviewing to establish your criteria for success. Some of the
different physical layers are Ethernet, WAN (.i.e. Frame Relay, T/E1,
T/E3, cable, XDSL),WiFietc. For any of these physical layers you
would need to review individually or at a conversion point like with
at TAP at your main Ethernet connection. This is the most common
visualization point for evaluating a network.

When evaluating and establishing any measure point or stat, one must
consider delta times, time of day, day of week, day of monthetc. As
the evaluation points will change due to many variables like maybe
the accounting segment will usually be very busy as they are closing
out the month or quarter just like your pulse rate will be higher just
after you were running. Everything that we establish as point for
evaluation must have all the variables within reason accounted for in
the comparison equation.

There are several ways and layers of benchmarking. The first is to look
at the physical layer with a real TAP for access ( i.e. Network
Instruments or Garland Tech) access with a competent datascope. My
screen shot below contains some of the values one might want to
consider at the Ethernet physical layer.
What is important in the Physical Layer?


First if you are using a Monitor port or SPAN off of a switch you will
not get all if any of the Errors as the switch bus grooms and drops all
errored frames not to mention casuing other issues. The timing or basic
stats will also be offset..however the good frame counts will be close
enough for comparison.

The Frame Error level is really part of the seconf layer of the OSI stack.
The Data layer which is really the Frame layer but there is more as
you will see below.

Each Physical layer will have its special set of important values and
revelant to how the information was acquired and the method by
which the information was acquired.
Here are some WiFi Physical layer stats for comparison from a
AirPCAP card from CACE Techology now RiverBed Technology with
Wireshark (Gerald Combs).
This is an example of the basic Wireless information from Wireshark
that can be available for later comparison and evaluation -


A Flow Graphic overview from Wireshark


The next layer to consider is the Data LayerIn the TCP/IP model the
phrsical Layer and Data Layer are considered as one layer. This is
acceptable as long as there is not an intermediate physical layer like
WiFi. Also the Data Layer has many other valuable statistics for
consideration above the Physical Layer statistics like VLAN with
Channel info, Subnets, IP addresses, Packet/Protocol types, see above.

Once you get above the Physical and Data links you get into the heart
of the TCP/IP stack.
There are any number of statistics that you can use for benchmarking
from the basic to the complex see below


Connection and protocol


You can use any or all (a bit much) of these as benchmarks for the
network.
You can use a SPAN/monitor port for a benchmark of who is connected
to whom, types of protocol being used..etc
The SPAN can be used for many studies except those that are time
based or those that reqiuire checking frame errors.
A TAP, Telecommunications Access Point is the best and technicially
sound method for accessing your frames for benchmarking.

A very good stat on % packets from Wireshark


So many potentialsso little time!

Find what is important in your network from the Physical layer up
and use as your evaluation statistic for the health of your network.
Find the pulse, temperatureetc so you can quickly look at the
different levels of your network and see if there are issues you need to
deal with and why did your baseline change.
Do not be blindfolded
get into your network, look at it as many ways as
you can and find the essential weighting points
and use them regularly to evaluate and
verify the success of your network while being
alerted to potential issues.
There are no set rules just look at your network
layers with a good analyzer or even several
different analyzersfrom Wireshark to
commercial analyzers, filter your view with a tool
like the Ixia NTO, make it your network
stethoscope!
I wish you Great Success.