Automatic Auditing of PABX Equipment

As part of my ‘real-world’ job, I write decoders and web interfaces for PABX auditing tools. This is a job that I have done now for nearly 18 years!

I decided therefore avid reader, that you should have a little look at what I do!

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Imagine that you have 50 telephone systems in your network, and 10,000 extensions hanging off those PABX’s. How on earth do you audit them?Lets look at the options;

• “Man in a van”
• Remote Audit via proprietary software
• Rely on your maintainer’s site records

Man in a Van

Whilst this can be effective, it is has huge cost and environmental disadvantages. In addition, it is hugely time-consuming and can be inaccurate (imagine 10 different engineers all documenting the information in a different manner)

Remote Audit via Vendor Software

Ok – this is quite useful, but generally not particularly effective when you have multiple PABX’s. The reasons are; 

• You cannot automate the process
• You cannot compile the data to give a enterprise view of your estate
• The information is proprietary to each vendor

Rely on Maintainers Site Records

Really?  :o)

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So… a solution was required…We needed basically achieve the following tasks;

1. Capture the configuration of a PABX regardless of the Vendor
2. Store that information centrally
3. Allow reporting of the configuration in a common manner (that didn’t require PABX training)
4. Provide “enterprise” reports
5. Allow these reports to be run from ANY machine without installing any software (basically, “Web-based”)
6. Allow non-trained users to ‘explore’ the PABX in a tree-like manner
7. Automatically show any changes between two scans (e.g. “Swaps” or “Moves and Changes”)

The solution was “Asset Manager” – This application, borne from the company I work for, meets all of the about and more.

At present we support Mitel, Nortel, Siemens, Avaya, Ericsson and 3Com PABX’s, with more being added all the time. There is a live online demonstration at www.mit-comms.co.uk/asset_manager.asp which lets you explore the ‘tree’ and other reports.

The report engine is written to work with IE5.5+, Opera and FireFox without any plugins or applets.

Here are some examples of the reports it generates:-