IP address management : augmenting Sandia's capabilities through open source tools.

Abstract

Internet Protocol (IP) address management is an increasingly growing concern at Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) and the networking community as a whole. The current state of the available IP addresses indicates that they are nearly exhausted. Currently SNL doesn't have the justification to obtain more IP address space from Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA). There must exist a local entity to manage and allocate IP assignments efficiently. Ongoing efforts at Sandia have been in the form of a multifunctional database application notably known as Network Information System (NWIS). NWIS is a database responsible for a multitude of network administrative services including IP address management. This study will explore the feasibility of augmenting NWIS's IP management capabilities utilizing open source tools. Modifications of existing capabilities to better allocate available IP address space are studied.