Introduction
Business owners worldwide are shifting focus to adapting technology in their day-to-day business operations to improve their daily and routine operations. This has been brought about by the need to improve operations and manage its employees. One of the technological initiatives taken is network automation. Network automation has been triggered by the need to ease the complexity of business networking technology, which has helped automate and reduce manual and difficult tasks into manageable tasks. With network automation, businesses have gained through standardized network structure and the introduction of a network enterprise that is very reliable. Through this article, we are going to introduce what network automation is, how network automation works, the benefits that network automation brings to your enterprise if adapted, what best practices of network automation exist, and finally, the top network automation vendors that have taken over the current market and best maintenance and service company available to support your company or business on matters network automation. Let us dive deeper into understanding network automation.
Defining Network Automation
Network automation is a technological process where well-designed software is used to manage available network resources and the services offered by the network, which is achieved through the software-defined network, abbreviated as SDN. The purpose of SDN is to control and automate the networks.
Besides managing the network resources, network automation plays a significant role in configuring, testing, operating, and deploying components required in your network. The complexity of the enterprise network in the modern business world has led to a high demand for tools for automating networks. Such network automation tools serve the following purpose in a business setup.
- Automation of the network
- Supplying the physical and virtual networking nodes and devices
- Carrying analysis of the real-time processed data and delivery of elaborate insights
- Improving the security features associated with the network
- Automating, managing, and monitoring of the enterprise network.
Network Automation Types
Figure 1: Network Automation Courtesy of Pixabay
Any system that uses wireless networks, cloud networks, WANs, and LANs can be automated. This automation process can be achieved through either script-driven, software-based, or intent-based types of network automation.
Let us discuss what these types of network automation are:
- Script-Based
This type of network automation uses scripting and programming languages to perform its automation activities. To achieve this automation, exact triggers, and repetitive processes are involved.
The type of network automation uses Perl, TLC, Rudy, Python, Ansible, Go, and Bash programming languages. Rudy, Ansible, and Python have come into play to help solve challenging network automation tasks arising from the complexity of modern-day networking.
- Software-based
This type of network automation is also called intelligent automation. The network automation uses an administrator portal for coordination, which eliminates the writing of commands manually. This type of network automation uses templates to create and execute tasks following plain language rules.
- Intent-based
This is the latest tool of home automation among the three known tools. It uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to comprehend and learn the business and user intent, automatically changing how the business network policy is applied.
Network Automation Fundamental Components
Modern network automation is made up of the following three fundamental components for it to be complete:
- Trigger, which is the automation request
- Automator, which is the engine behind automation performing
- Target, which receives the automation.
Trigger
Triggers are requests sent to a network system to stimulate it to perform a specific network automation activity. Network automation triggers originate from several sources, such as the IT system IPI call, users script-kicking off, and many other network events. The purpose of triggers is to input necessary data on what events should happen to initiate a network automation activity.
Automator
The Automator is the heart or engine of the network automation system. This is where the exact network automation occurs once it receives relevant information from the trigger. It quickly starts the necessary workflow suitable for executing the required change. The Automator can request more information from the trigger during the execution process. After execution, it questions the IT system to confirm if the changes initiated are enough to solve the targeted problem. Finally, the Automator communicates the success or failure of the trigger after the change has been initiated to the target.
Target
This is the sole receiver of the network automation requests. It is exactly where the Automator performs the changes requested by the trigger. The Automator requests the target while the target executes the request and returns feedback to the Automator.
Network Automation Benefits to Your Business
Network automation brings so many benefits to the organization that everyone can notice, including the employees with little knowledge of what is happening within the IT department.
Such benefits are discussed below:
- Experiencing a reliable network: An automated network can predict and prevent system multifunctional issues. This automatic system can capture information and data from several sources, such as routers, event logs, employee devices, and switches, making the network more reliable, thus improving system performance, security, and utilization of the organization’s resources.
- Experiencing reduced risk: Systems interacting with humans experience more risk. Network automation reduces human interaction with the network, thus eradicating the risks associated with them.
- Initiating quick changes: The system can make random and frequent changes with network automation. IT experts use alerts from such systems to make necessary changes within the shortest time possible. Remember, this system can be programmed to adapt to changes.
- Source of performance optimization: The automated network has support and monitoring devices that alert the organization’s IT experts of any performance issue. Instead of the expert handling the issues manually, they are solved through an automated network dashboard. This aids in optimizing the performance of the organization and network systems at large.
Where do you Find the Best Solutions for Your Network Automation?
For several years, BASS LLC has been offering exemplary services regarding network automation. Through BASS LLC, an SIRA-certified and licensed organization, your business is assured of better-structured cabling, world-class UPS storage and servers, wireless LANS and routers, video intercom for villas, integrated VoIP solutions, and better commercial displays. Always visit their website to request their modern network automation services.
