Network Diagram

This page is also in the Groundskeeper wiki: https://github.com/rsjsoftwareltd/groundskeeper/wiki/Network-Diagram

The Network page draws a diagram of the systems Groundskeeper monitors, coloured by how each one is doing. It builds itself from your connector settings, so there is nothing to draw by hand. You can move boxes around, give them your own names, and export the result as a picture.

Open it from the Network item in the sidebar, or at https://<server-address>:8443/network. Admin and technician accounts can use it, including the editing controls. An SLT account cannot.

What the diagram is made from #

The diagram is built from your connector settings and status, not from the agents on your PCs. Each box stands for something a connector watches. The page reloads the data every two minutes.

Box	Where it comes from
Internet	Always shown. Its colour comes from the Internet Health connector.
Firewall	The WatchGuard Firebox connector. Named by its address, or "WatchGuard Firewall".
Switches	Each switch listed in the Switches (SNMP) connector, and each Meraki switch the Meraki connector has found. If no switch is set up, one placeholder "Core Switch" is drawn.
Access points	Each Meraki access point individually. Until Meraki has reported its devices, one "Meraki APs" box stands for all of them.
Servers	Servers listed in the Windows Servers, iDRAC and Hyper-V connectors, merged by name. The first six are drawn. With none listed, one "Domain Controller" box is drawn.
DNS & DHCP	The DNS & DHCP connector. With several DHCP servers it is named by the first, plus "N more".
Backup	The Veeam connector.
UPS	The UPS connector, when it is on or has UPSes listed.
Printers	The Printers / MFDs connector, when it is on or has printers listed.
Microsoft 365	The Microsoft 365 service health connector.
Endpoints	A box for each of Action1, WatchGuard Endpoint and Windows Client health that is switched on. These stand for a group of managed machines, not single devices.

A box can appear even when its connector is off. The Firewall, Backup and Microsoft 365 boxes are always drawn, and show as disabled until you set the connector up.

Reading the colours #

The dot in the corner of each box, and its border, show the status:

Green -- OK. The connector is polling and has raised nothing worse than information in the last four hours.
Amber -- Warning. It has raised a warning in the last four hours.
Red -- Critical. It has raised a critical in the last four hours, or its last poll failed.
Grey, dashed border -- Disabled. The connector is switched off.
Grey -- Unknown. The connector is on but has not polled yet.

Meraki devices are coloured from the status Meraki reports for each device.

The line under the diagram reads, for example, "24 nodes - 20 live - 6 links from LLDP evidence - updated 09:42". "Live" counts the green boxes.

A purple dashed outline marks a box you have marked as planned.

Which lines are real #

Be careful with the lines. Only some of them are discovered.

Links between switches and access points can be evidence. Groundskeeper reads each switch's and Meraki device's LLDP neighbour table and joins two boxes when one reports the other as its neighbour. The line under the diagram counts these links. A neighbour that matches nothing Groundskeeper knows about is left off.
Everything else is a best guess at the layout. The firewall is drawn joined to the first switch in your list, which is treated as the core. A switch with no LLDP evidence is chained to the one before it. Servers, DNS & DHCP, backup, UPS, printers and endpoint groups are drawn joined to that first switch, whether or not they are plugged into it. Meraki devices with no LLDP evidence are drawn joined to it too. Microsoft 365 is drawn joined to the Internet.
When there is LLDP evidence for more than one level of switches, the switch row is split into levels, with the core at the top and its neighbours below. Switches without evidence are grouped on their own row at the end.

The style of a line does not tell you which kind it is. Servers are drawn with solid lines even though the link is a guess. The links to DNS & DHCP, backup, UPS, printers, Microsoft 365, the endpoint groups and unconfirmed Meraki devices are dashed. The links from the Internet to the firewall, the firewall to the first switch, and between chained switches are dashed when their connector is off. The legend reads "Dashed: assumed or not confirmed", which covers all of those: a dashed line is either a guessed link or one whose connector is not reporting.

So treat the diagram as a picture of what Groundskeeper monitors and how it is doing. Use it as a cabling diagram only for the links LLDP has confirmed, which needs LLDP to be switched on at the switches. See Connectors.

Moving around #

Zoom with the mouse wheel, or with the +, - and reset buttons at the bottom right of the diagram.
Pan by dragging the background.
A large estate does not squash. A row of more than five boxes wraps, up to eight across, and the canvas grows, so zoom out to see it all.
Click a box to open a panel under the diagram: its name, a line about what it is, and its status. The panel's text describes the type of box in general (for example, what the Veeam connector covers). It is not a live reading for that device. For live figures, use the Dashboard or Devices.

Editing the layout #

Click Edit layout (top right). A hint appears, and the button changes to Done editing.

Drag a box to move it. The new position is saved as soon as you let go.
Click a box to change its display label (up to 64 characters), or tick Mark as planned (not yet live), then click Save changes.
Reset this node puts that box back to its automatic position, name and not-planned state.

Click Done editing when you have finished.

Your changes are only ever to position, name and the planned flag. A box's status always comes from the connectors, so renaming or moving a box cannot make a problem look better. The changes are saved on the server, so everyone sees them. Admin and technician accounts can both make them.

Explain this diagram #

Explain this diagram asks the AI for a plain-English description of the current diagram, shown in a panel under it. It needs AI switched on. Each use counts towards the daily AI question limit. If AI is off or the limit is reached, the panel says so.

Exporting #

Export PNG saves the whole diagram as a picture, at twice the screen size.
Export SVG saves it as a vector file you can open in a drawing tool.

Both save the whole diagram, whatever the current zoom or pan, and include your edits. The files are called groundskeeper-network.png and groundskeeper-network.svg.