NetBrain Network Discovery Topology and Pathing

Modern networks span on-premises, Cloud, SD-WAN, and virtual overlays. NetBrain turns that sprawl into an operational map you can trust by automating discovery, visualizing real-time topology, and computing hop-accurate paths so NetOps can troubleshoot faster, plan safer changes, and document continuously.

In this article, we attempt to provide a practical overview of the Domain Management section in NetBrain, focusing on how to utilize each capability together: Discovery & Mapping, Benchmarking, Data Modeling, and Visibility & Analysis. Use this as an orientation guide, a coaching handout, or a checklist when setting up or tuning a network with NetBrain.

The NetBrain Platform unifies these functions into a single operating loop that turns network devices and telemetry into reliable, actionable insight.

What does this mean to you as a Network Operator?

Teams can:

• Automatically build an accurate inventory and topology of heterogeneous networked environments (infrastructure from multiple vendors or mixed on-premises + cloud)
• Standardize fields for consistent reporting and automation
• Visualize live maps, which will result in policy-backed "Intent" (We will dive into this in the next module.)
• Baseline key metrics to validate changes and catch drift early

The result is faster troubleshooting and change validation, lower operational risk, repeatable runbooks, and a continuously improving source of truth that aligns day-to-day NetOps with business priorities. We will begin by creating a repeatable NetOps workflow to move from Discovery to Benchmarking and, finally, Modeling, putting together the building blocks to enable Visibility & Analysis. Then we'll run it on a schedule to capture updated network changes while maintaining the current state. You will move from discovery through topology and pathing exercises, turning theory into day-one, practical workflows your team can use immediately.

How the Pieces Fit (at a Glance)

NetBrain's Network section functions as a continuous feedback loop, discovering, enriching, standardizing, analyzing, and benchmarking so your "source of truth" and day-to-day operations stay in sync and become more accurate with each cycle. Let's walk through the feature functions that make up this loop construct:

Discovery + Topology Mapping builds and updates your inventory and topology from live devices, on-premises, or in the cloud. NetBrain uses a Front Server as the in-network probe for CLI, SNMP, and traceroute (via SSH/Telnet) to collect configurations and runtime state. For controller and cloud integrations, you can configure an API Server and assign it to a Front Server, so NetBrain can reach those endpoints and pull data via APIs.

In short:

• Front Server = network probe and reachability
• API Server = the API calls that populate discovery

The purpose of this discovery is to build and maintain an authoritative heterogeneous OEM device list and topology.

ATC-Specific Lab Workflow

Below is the network topology for the lab in the Learning Path. We will use this to demonstrate, in a safe Digital Twin, how NetBrain turns raw topology into repeatable, map-driven workflows for discovery, path analysis, validation, and continuous improvement.

NetBrain's Digital Twin is a robust virtual representation of your live network that provides a comprehensive understanding of all relationships and dependencies, helping experts maintain connectivity and uninterrupted workflows. This digital twin is created by scheduled / on-demand discovery and benchmarking, providing an exact, live representation of devices, configs, topology, and paths.

Network Under Test Architecture

Overlay BGP Backbone: The overlay BGP backbone is the control-plane fabric that ties the entire site together, maintains inter-router reachability, and enables fast convergence.

The core Cisco IOS routers—R1 (192.168.2.20), R2 (192.168.2.21), and R3 (192.168.2.22) form BGP peerings across /30 subnetted point-to-point links (for example, 10.0.1.0/30 between R1–R2 and 10.0.1.4/30 between R2–R3). Advertising the router loopback provides stable peering endpoints, and the network operator can apply policy via route-maps and communities without disturbing the underlay.

Core Layer: The core layer's role is simple: fast transit between distribution blocks. It uses the same point-to-point interfaces that interconnect the routers as an underlay to carry the BGP overlay's next hops. The core avoids heavy policy, NAT, or complex filtering to ensure quick convergence and a predictable forwarding path.

NetOps Priorities:

Operationally, this is where you monitor adjacency health, interface counters, and BGP session stability, since failures here ripple outward and affect broad portions of the network.

Distribution Layer (iBGP redistribution): The distribution layer is the policy and reachability boundary between the core and access layers. Router-1 (east) and Router-3 (west) face their access neighbors, learn local routes (such as the 10.0.12.0/30 and 10.0.13.0/30), and then selectively redistribute those routes into iBGP toward the overlay.

NetOps Priorities:

The distribution layer is the right place to shape routing with route-maps, communities, and summarization to keep the core's routing table small and stable. Northbound iBGP carries access-learned reachability across the backbone; southbound protocols (often OSPF in this scenario) feed default or summary routes back to the access layer.

Access Layer: The access layer is where endpoints and leaf switches attach and where most user and application traffic first enters the network. Arista vEOS-2 (192.168.2.112) uplinks to Router-1 over 10.0.12.0/30, and vEOS-1 (192.168.2.111) uplinks to Router-3 over 10.0.13.0/30. These devices will run OSPF toward the distribution layer, receiving a default or summarized route in return.

NetOps Priorities:

Day-to-day operations here focus on interface state, neighbor health, and simple intent checks to catch miscabling, mismatched masks, or flapping adjacencies that quickly become visible to users.

How NetBrain ties it together: NetBrain discovers devices, loopbacks, and /30 point-to-point links, models their roles (core, distribution, access), and generates dynamic maps that capture the network's exact state at a point in time. From those maps, you can pivot into live data (interfaces, BGP/OSPF neighbors), run intents to verify adjacencies and policies, and use pathing to trace a flow from an access vEOS through distribution into the BGP overlay, hop by hop.

In Conclusion

This closed loop of discovery, benchmarking, and mapping will provide the system we need to visualize, verify, and trace the environment, turning a static, layered design into an interactive troubleshooting and change-validation workflow.

Now we are in a good place to trace cause-and-effect across layers to isolate the "why," not just the "what." The outcome is faster mean time to insight, safer changes, and a design that continuously proves itself under real conditions. By the end of this module, you should be able to stand up a minimal environment, run an initial discovery, confirm the data model aligns with naming and ownership standards, render a path and view that answers a specific operational question, and validate it against a baseline, ultimately closing the loop with an auditable record of what you checked and what you found.