IP SLA is a probe/agent software engine built into Cisco IOS/CatOS software to allow for interface-to-interface synthetic transactions.  The most commonly used are VoIP or jitter tests, but others such as web, DNS, DHCP, and other services are available.    IP SLA is a descendant of  SAA (Service Assurance Agent) and it great-grandfather, old RPING.  Similar technology is also available from Juniper, called RPM (Real-time Performance Module), and appliance-based engines like Brix Networks (now EXFO).  The concept is the same: synthetic transactions that reveal point-to-point performance characteristics within your network.

The beauty of the technology lies in the ability to perform link state monitoring instead of device-based monitoring.  With the advent of advanced routing protocols (MPLS is a prime example), device/interface monitoring is becoming more and more inaccurate as a monitoring standard.  Performing real-time testing of connection availability, performance, and quality is quickly becoming the method of choice to distinguish between network quality issues  and application performance issues.  Link state monitoring allows for high quality, point-to-point monitoring to be deployed to verify end-to-end network quality, all controlled and maintained easily from within the network group.    Here at Monolith, we believe that IP SLA and other comparable link-state monitoring technologies are an absolute requirement for most customers today.

Monolith provides great capabilities with link state monitoring.   For problem detection, we have standard thresholding for MOS/RFactor scores, trend thresholding on long term changes, and abnormal behavior thresholds for short term deviations.  For display, we offer a 100% multi-tenant portal–based display of custom dashboards and summary overviews.  For ease of use, all these configurations are discovered and can be configured to be automatically monitoring with little or no administrative time.  You can even make these metrics the backbone of your SLA monitoring with our robust BSM/SLM engines.   Click here to learn more about our IP SLA capability and see some screenshots  collected by Monolith, or read our white paper, Cisco IP SLA Overview.

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IP SLA, Link State Monitoring, Cisco, Juniper, RPM, SLM, BSM, Service Level Management, Business Service Management, MPLS, Network Performance Monitoring