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Effects of Range Type on Discovery Workflows

Depending on the type of network range defined for a discovery environment, different reconciliation rules and discovery workflows are applied.

To support different types of environments, the IP Address CI contains the Lease Time attribute which stores the type of network range. The type of network range the routing domain, and certain discovery options determine the reconciliation rules and workflows that are applied to that network range.

Updates to the IP Address CI occur when ranges are updated, when IP Address CIs are reported by the Data Flow Probe, or when new IP/MAC pairs are discovered. This behavior minimizes unnecessary add and delete operations for IP Address CIs.

For descriptions of typical environments for range types, and for information on how to configure range types, see New/Edit Range Dialog Box.

For explanations on choosing the best discovery options for Client types ranges, see Discovery Options for Client IP Ranges.

The following explains the range types and discovery options, and the effects on data reconciliation:

Range Type Discovery Option Discovery Workflow Effects on Data Reconciliation
Data Center N/A

  1. Ping Sweep by ICMP job runs.

    Note MAC addresses are not captured during a ping sweep discovery job.

  2. Node CI is created.
  3. Host Connection jobs run.
  4. Inventory Discovery jobs and Universal Discovery Agent related jobs run.
 If the IP addresses that are discovered during two unique discovery runs are identical, the data is merged into a single IP Address CI.
Client SNMP

  1. Client SNMP Discovery job runs to discover ARP-enabled devices that provide IP/MAC pair information.

  2. IP/MAC Address Harvesting job runs against SNMP devices to retrieve IP/MAC pair information.

  3. New or updated IP/MAC pair information and a CallHomeEvent CI is reported to UCMDB.

  4. The Host Connection job and the Call Home Processing job runs.

  5. Inventory Discovery jobs and Universal Discovery Agent-related jobs run. However, if the Data Flow Probe cannot establish a connection with the discovery node or a job is waiting for other tasks to complete, the workflow is put into a parked state.

    A CallHomeEvent CI is received by UCMDB when the Universal Discovery Agent sends a call home message to the Data Flow Probe, or when a new IP/MAC address pair is harvested from an ARP cache job. As a result, a Call Home Processing job is triggered and the parked workflow is put into an activated state. Then, the Inventory Discovery jobs and Universal Discovery Agent-related jobs run. For more information on parked workflows and other traffic cases, see Call Home Overview.

If the IP addresses that are discovered during two unique discovery jobs are different but the ARP/MAC values are identical, the data is merged into a single IP Address CI.

If the IP addresses that are discovered during two unique discovery jobs are different and the ARP/MAC addresses are null or undetermined, the data is merged into a single IP Address CI if the Interface IDs are identical.
Without SNMP

  1. Ping Sweep by ICMP job runs.

    Note MAC addresses are not captured during a ping sweep discovery job.

  2. Host Connection jobs run.
  3. Inventory Discovery jobs and Universal Discovery Agent-related jobs run.

Standalone (i.e., not connected to any CIs) IP addresses without ARP/MAC values are reported to UCMDB. However, IP addresses that are connected to a CI (i.e., not standalone) and without ARP/MAC values are not reported to UCMDB.

If an IP address without an IP/MAC value is discovered, and there is another instance of the same IP address together with the same domain name, the two instances are reconciled. This behavior occurs whether there are IP/MAC values or not.