[H-GEN] tracking network usage

[Nick Kwiatkowski]

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On Wed, 17 Sep 2003, Willie Yeo wrote:
> At 11:09 AM 17/09/2003, you wrote:
>> thanks to Niks suggestion, I did check the adsl modem, and it has logged
>> 3.3 gig of data recieved in the last 23 days. ringing tpg now to see
>> what they say,
>
> This may and may not be relevant, but don't trust the counters on
> the modem.
>
> Simply put, what type of registers are the counter ? Once the
> counters are over-flowed, it resets itself back to zero and starts again.
>
> Coz' some modem/routers can only handle 8,000,000,000 before it
> starts resetting itself back to zero and start again.
>
> You >might< want to get some sort of program to monitor your usage
> over the days and ten if it overflows, you will know.

Correct, but in this case he hadn't set-up anything like that to monitor
traffic.
Personally, I like snort[1] for network monitoring, as it has other nice
features. As for the modem counters, it really depends on the modem. A lot
of the current modems do have accurate logging and offer it as an audit
facility to help manage network usage and billing. The modems that have a
SNMP interface would be the ones that "should" be more accurate :)


Ciao,

Nik


[1] SNORT http://www.snort.org - go the pig!!!

Nickolas Kwiatkowski
IT Architect
AMS Solutions Enablement (ASE)
Application Management Services
IBM Global Services
phone:  07 3887 6304,  mobile:  0412 121 276,  email:  nickolas at au1.ibm.com
"In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity" - Albert Einstein


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