How to Monitor Routing Neighbors with Solarwinds (2023)

Solarwinds Orion has a great feature to monitor all your routing neighbors like BGP, OSPF and EIGRP. Solarwind routing neighbor monitoring provides information such as the routing neighbor protocol configured on a device, its status, and the time the routing neighbor was last modified.

We can also configure alerts for the routing neighbors monitored in Solarwinds; This helps us identify and resolve the issue as quickly as possible. If the problem goes undetected, it can have significant repercussions. We can avoid these problems with Solarwinds advanced alert function. Also, we can use the Solarwinds reporting feature to get configured routing neighbors in the area with their current status. This can be used as inventory to route neighbors in the network infrastructure. Click hereshortcutto test Solarwinds routing neighbor monitoring.

Now let's see how to monitor routing neighbors and set up alerts and reports with Solarwinds.

How to monitor routing neighbors

To monitor routing neighbors on a router, we need to monitor the router using SNMP. The respective routing neighbors must be enabled for monitoring in the feature list page when adding the router for monitoring.

To enable routing neighbor monitoring for nodes that are already available in monitoring, open Router and clicklist functionson the node overview page.

Select and click the available routing neighbors on the device you want to monitorOf youto save the changes.

This is how we can enable routing neighbor monitoring for a router. Follow the steps below to check the routing neighbor details on the router.

1. Open the router you want to check to check the status of routing neighbors.
2. click onredin the left navigation area on the node overview page.
   
3. NOredpage you will find therouting neighborsRouting Neighbor Details Widget.
   
4. orouting neighborThe widget can be placed in another column within theredControl panel according to the configuration of your environment.

In this way we can activate the monitoring of routing neighbors for the routers available in the network infrastructure. Now let's see how to configure alerts for neighbor routing.

Configure Routing Neighbor Alerts

Alerts can be configured based on the state of the routing neighbor. Alerts must be configured separately for each routing protocol, since their status value is different. Trigger conditions are different for each routing neighbor. All other steps are the same as the standard steps for setting up alerts. Click here for full alert setup stepsshortcut. Learn how to define trigger conditions and customize the email alert action for each protocol.

Alarm Trigger Condition for BGP Neighbors

Complete the following steps to configure the trigger condition for BGP routing neighbors.

1. On the Trigger Condition page, selectrouting neighborsVonI want to warnthe dropdown lists.
   
2. ChooseJust follow the set of objects.SobThe scope of the alert.
   
3. ChooseSearch in all fieldsVonselect the fielddrop down list
   
4. Chooseprotocol nameVonrouting neighborstable and clickChoose.
   
5. MentionBGPin the text field.
   
6. NOactual activation conditionsection, selectAt least one subcondition (OR) must be met.
   
7. ChooseSearch in all fieldsVonselect the fielddrop down list
   
8. ChooseProtokoll des Orion-StateVonrouting neighborslow hill.
   
9. ChooseLowin the drop down list.
   
10. Now click on the + icon and selectAdd single value comparisonto add another condition.
    
11. ChooseSearch in all fieldsVonselect the fielddrop down list
12. ChooseRegistration status descriptionVonrouting neighborslow hill.
    
13. Chooseis unequal tomiFoundedin the dropdown lists.
    
14. We now define conditions to trigger alerts when the BGP routing neighbor fails or the routing neighbor state is not established.
15. Let's see how to customize the email notification action to forward neighbor notifications.
16. NOtrigger actionssection, clickadd action.
    
17. Scroll down and selectemail/pageAction.
    
18. Set the recipient details.
19. Expand the Message section.
20. click oninsert variableto put the router name, routing neighbor, and IP address in the subject line of the email.
21. Search for the protocol in the search box, select itprotocol nameof the result and clickinsert variable.
    
22. click oninsert variableagain to put the IP address of the BGP neighbor in the subject.
23. Search neighbor in the search field, selectneighbor IPof the result and clickinsert variable.
    
24. To add the router name to the subject, clickinsert variable, look forrouterand enter the variable.
    
25. The text of the message can also be customized usinginsert variablePossibility.
26. Provide your custom message and bring the required variables.
    
27. Adjust the subject and text of the email according to your needs and save the action.
28. Click Next and copy the trigger action to thereset actionSection and make the necessary changes and actions.
29. Review the summary page and clickOf youto save the warning.
30. Every time the alarm condition is met, an alarm is triggered for the BGP neighbors.

Alarm Trigger Condition for EIGRP Neighbors

Follow steps 1-4 in the previous section.

1. MentionEIGRP de Ciscoin the text box where we need to mention the name of the protocol.
   
2. NOactual activation conditionsection, selectAt least one subcondition (OR) must be met.
   
3. ChooseSearch in all fieldsVonselect the fielddrop down list
   
4. ChooseProtokoll des Orion-StateVonrouting neighborslow hill.
   
5. ChooseLowin the drop down list.
   
6. Now click on the + icon and selectAdd single value comparisonto add another condition.
   
7. ChooseSearch in all fieldsVonselect the fielddrop down list
8. ChooseRegistration status descriptionVonrouting neighborslow hill.
   
9. Chooseis unequal tomiFoundedin the dropdown lists.
   
10. We now define conditions to trigger alerts when the EIGRP routing neighbor fails or the routing neighbor's state is down.

The email alert action can be configured as the steps described above in the BGP section.

Alarm trigger condition for OSPF neighbors

Follow steps 1 through 4 in the BGP Neighbor Activation Condition section.

1. MentionOSPFin the text box where we need to mention the name of the protocol.
   
2. NOactual activation conditionsection, selectAt least one subcondition (OR) must be met.
   
3. ChooseSearch in all fieldsVonselect the fielddrop down list
   
4. ChooseProtokoll des Orion-StateVonrouting neighborslow hill.
   
5. ChooseLowin the drop down list.
   
6. Now click on the + icon and selectAdd single value comparisonto add another condition.
   
7. ChooseSearch in all fieldsVonselect the fielddrop down list
8. ChooseRegistration status descriptionVonrouting neighborslow hill.
   
9. Chooseis unequal tomiCompletein the respective drop-down lists.
   
10. Whenever the OSPF routing neighbor state is down or the routing neighbor state is not full, an alert is generated.

The email alert action can be configured as the steps described above in the BGP section.

How to Generate Routing Neighbor Status Reports

Routing neighbor status reports for neighbors such as BGP, OSPF, and EIGRP can be retrieved in a single report or in separate reports, depending on your needs. Let's create a single report for all routing neighbors. To learn how to create a report from scratch, click the followingshortcut. In this demo, we will see how to modify the report query builder and insert the required columns for the routing neighbor status report.

1. Choosecustom tablein the resource area.
2. Chooseadvanced pickerNODynamic Query Builder.
3. ChooserouterVonI want to informdrop down list
   
4. ChooseAt least one subcondition (OR) must be metin the drop down list.
   
5. click onselect the field, select Protocol Name in the Neighbor Routing table, and clickadd column.
   
6. Mention BGP in the text box.
   
7. Click the + icon and selectAdd simple condition.
8. Add two more conditions, mentionOSPFmiEIGRP de Ciscoand clickadd design.
   
9. The report manager directs us to thetable arrangementpage as soon as we clickadd design.
10. click onadd columnto select the required columns for our report.
11. We need the router name, routing protocol name, routing neighbor, and its state in the report.
12. Let's select the column from the respective tables.
13. ChoosedirectoryVonrouterTable to include the router name in the report.
    
14. Select the columns related to routing neighborsrouting neighborstable and clickadd column.
    
15. The selected columns will be added to our table layout.
    
16. click onpreview functionto validate the data.
    
17. Close the preview and clickOf youto save the layout of the table.
18. Now follow the standard reporting steps to complete the report generation.

We can schedule this report to be sent automatically to a number of recipients at a preferred frequency. For information on how to schedule the report, see the Report Scheduling section of this document.shortcut.

This allows us to efficiently monitor routing neighbors such as BGP, OSPF, and EIGRP available to a router in your network environment. Alerts can be configured to trigger whenever a routing neighbor problem takes immediate action and prevents significant business impact. Reports can be generated periodically to manage routing neighbors.