Network Life Cycle

Created by Michael Law

Citations
 Teare, Diane, 2008. Authorized Self-Study Guide:
Designing for Cisco Internetwork Solutions (DESIGN),
Second Edition. 800 East 96th Street, Indianapolis,
Indiana 46240 USA: Cisco Press
 Cisco Systems, Inc
Network Life Cycle
Prepare

Optimize Plan

Operate Design

Implement
Prepare Phase
 Identify customer requirements.
 Develop network strategy.
 Propose high-level conceptual architecture.
 Identify technologies that will be implemented.
 Assess the scope of the network design project.
 Identifying required information.
 Understanding organizational goals/constraints and
technical goals/constraints.
Prepare Phase - Extension
Identification Hierarchy

Organizational
Organizational Goals Technical Goals Technical Constraints
Constraints

Add New Improve

Existing
Customer Budget Network
Equipment
Services Performance

Improve Improve
Customer Bandwidth
Personnel Security and
Support Availability
Reliability

Decrease
Reduce Costs Policies Application
Expected
Availability
Downtime

Increase Modernize Lack of

Schedule Outdated Qualified
Competiveness
Technology Personnel
Plan Phase
 Identifying network requirements.
 Assess locations and existing network information.
 Perform gap analysis to determine if existing
infrastructure can support proposed system.
 This will manage tasks, responsibilities, critical
milestones and resources required to implement.
 The output of this phase is a set of network
requirements.
Design Phase
 Design will be based on the requirements identified in
the plan phase.
 Gather information from customer input, network
audit, traffic analysis and network health checklist.
 A detailed design of the network is creates
documentation for infrastructure, services and
applications to be used.
 Create topological maps
Design Phase - Extension
Customer • Reviewing existing documentation including hardware,
software, configuration and location of devices and cabling.
• Obtain verbal input about network to determine impression
Input of network.

Network • Perform audit to judge against customer input of network.

• Reveals information about network including hardware,
Audit configuration and verification of existing documentation.

Traffic • Verifies set of applications currently on the network. Also

may reveal additional traffic unknown from the first two
steps.
Analysis • Reveal importance of traffic, priority and security.
Implement Phase
 The network is built according to the design
specifications.
 Integrate devices without disruption or creating a
point of vulnerability.
 Sub-phases of the implementation phase are listed in
order: description of step, reference to design,
implementation guidelines, rollback guidelines,
estimated time needed for implementation.
 Verification of design is found in the implementation
phase.
Operate Phase
 Maintain the network’s health on a day-to-day basis.
 Fault detection-and-correction and performance
monitoring occurs in the operate phase.
 Monitor the network for errors and problems.
Optimize Phase
 Proactive network management. Identify and resolve
problems before they occur.
 Reactive fault correction occurs when proactive
management cannot predict and mitigate failures.
 The optimize phase may lead to network re-design if
too many errors occur.