Cable Database

[Pete Morris]

Has anyone built a cable database or something similar?

I have 6 cabinets each with 10-15patchpanels in with 12 ports on each patch panel.
Some of the cabinets are connected to each other, some are not. This allows diverse routing.
If i plug a server in at one end it might have 2 connections. one connection might go through 5 cabinets and various ports. The other connection might go through 1 cabinet and 2 ports.
I would like to be able to display what connections any particular server uses and it's eventual destination.
I would also like to be able to see what spare ports are available in each cabinet.
If possible I would like to query the database to see what ports are available to get me to a specific cabinet.
I've been thinking about this but have come up with no specific solution.

 

[Ron_dK]

Why would you use a database for this.

This site has a dedicated software to configure and draw your {network}
cable system :

http://www.weresc.com/network.php

 

[Pete Morris]

this is just for network diagramming. I need to be able to show what ports are free, what equipment connects to every port and what route those connections take. That could be in the region of 2-300 ports.

 

[neileg]

Forgive me if I make mistakes because I’m only vaguely aware of how a patch panel works. I assume that each port is potentially connected to a piece of equipment and that a patch cable is used to connect one port to another. Therefore, each port has two connections, one many be to a piece of equipment and one to another port. Either or both of these connections may be empty. Both of these may be connected to other ports

So we need a table that has one record for each port that exists. This record will hold some static data, which cabinet, which panel, which port number. It will also hold dynamic data, which piece of equipment and which other port. The equipment will be held in another table, so you would hold this as FK in the port table. The other port will be self referring to the same table and will hold the other port PK as a sort of FK.

To find free ports is easy, just look for the PortID where the FK is null. You can group this data by cabinet.

Where there is a ‘daisy chain’ of patches, you will have to use some form of looping, looking for the next record and testing to see if both connections are to patch ports. Where there is either a free port or a port with an equipment ID, you’ve reached the end of the chain. Unfortunately, I don’t know how to do this, but I’m sure it can be done.

Don’t know if this helps?