Configure an Excluded Interfaces filter

[This is the Context-Sensitive Help topic for the Discovery Config: Excluded Interfaces: Interface Filter form.]

This configuration setting instructs NNMi to not add the specified Interfaces to the NNMi database (ignore that information when received from an SNMP agent), not acknowledge any Hints received about them, nor gather Discovery Hints from them. Therefore, NNMi does not monitor or communicate with those interfaces.

Once configured as an excluded interface:

• The interface's relationship to other objects is canceled:

  • Node
  • Address
  • VLAN Port

• The interface's membership status within any logical groups is removed:

  • Layer 2 Connections with Link Aggregation or Split Link Aggregation
  • Router Redundancy Groups
  • VLANs

• During the next discovery cycle, NNMi automatically removes any previously discovered data associated with an excluded interface.

The node and addresses associated with any interface identified in your Excluded Interface filter still shows up in the topology database and maps.

An Interface Group definition sets the criteria for exclusion. You can define Interface Groups using a wide range criteria choices. For example, the following Interface Group when used in an Excluded Interfaces filter instructs Spiral Discovery to ignore any Nortel routers' Virtual Interfaces. The selected Interface Group will be empty after the next Spiral Discovery cycle. Consider disabling the Interface Group definition's Add to View Filter List  attribute to prevent this empty Interface Group from appearing on selection lists within NNMi views:

Be careful to not exclude Interfaces that are important to your team.

Your Excluded Interfaces filter can be used in combination with an Included Interface Ranges filter. This strategy keeps network traffic to a minimum. The Included Interface Ranges use RFC 1213, MIB-II sysObjectID values paired with ifIndex ranges. Spiral Discovery then requests only information about that subset of Interfaces from a matching Node's SNMP agent.

If your Nodes have a high interface count and you want NNMi to Discover and Monitor only a subset of the most important Interfaces, consider using the Included Interface Ranges settings to identify the subset of important interfaces. Then your Excluded Interfaces Filter can instruct Spiral Discovery to reject a few items from within the included ifIndex ranges.

To exclude specific types of interfaces during the Spiral Discovery process:

1. Complete all prerequisites.

2. Navigate to the Excluded Interfaces tab.

   1. From the workspace navigation panel, select the  Configuration workspace.
   2. Expand Discovery.
   3. Select Discovery Configuration.
   4. Select the Excluded Interfaces tab.

3. Do one of the following:

   • To select an Interface Group to filter certain interfaces out of Spiral Discovery, click the New icon, and continue.
   • To edit an excluded interfaces setting, double-click the row representing the configuration you want to edit, and continue.
   • To delete an excluded interfaces setting, select a row, and click the Delete icon.
   • To refresh the list of excluded interface settings, click the Refresh icon.

4. In the Interface Filter form, click the  Lookup icon and select one of the options from the drop-down menu:

   •  Show Analysis to view Analysis Pane information for the currently selected Interface Group.
   •  Quick Find to view and select from the list of all existing Interface Groups.
   •  Open to display the details of the currently selected Interface Group.
   •  New to create a new Interface Group.

5. Click  Save and Close. Spiral Discovery implements your changes during the next regularly scheduled discovery interval. To apply the changes immediately, use Actions > Polling > Configuration Poll.

   You can also right-click any object in a table or map view to access the items available within the Actions menu.

Related topics

• Configure discovery
• Monitor Network Health