This document discusses using graphs and Neo4j to improve network and IT operations. It begins with an overview of how networks can be modeled as graphs. It then discusses using graphs for both proactive and reactive network management, giving examples of dependency analysis and helpdesk scenarios. Finally, it provides references to companies that use Neo4j for network and IT operations management in domains like travel, software monitoring, finance, and environmental sciences.

1. Taming the Complexity
of Network & IT Ops
Improving Network Operations With Neo4j & Graphs
Michael Hunger | @mesirii
Director Developer Relations Engineering

2. Agenda
• Networks are Graphs
• Network & IT-Operations with Graphs
• Network Upgrade and Helpdesk Scenarios
• Why Neo4j
• References and Resources
• Q&A

3. Networks are Graphs

4. network topology

6. Mesh
Router
Gatew
ay
Router
Router
Router
Mesh
Router
Router
Router
Mesh
Router
Gatew
ay
Access
Point
CPU
CPU CPU
CPU
Mobile
Mobile Mobile
Mobile
Base
Station
CPU
CPU
CPU
CPU
Access
Point

7. Infrastructure &
Asset Management

8. Data Model

9. Graph Structure
Exploration

10. Network & IT operations
Proactive Reactive

11. Proactive Scenario:
Dependency Analysis

12. Best,
John Lewis
Network Administrator
Email
#newyork
#london
#funstuff
#graphicdesign
#product_team
#marketing
#staff_info
#IT_maintenance
Slack
Premise:
We are the Network admins at the company ACME and we’re
planning on doing maintenance on a switch on a Friday afternoon.
Network Admins
Sys Admins
Notify Hi, maintenance scheduled for Switch IP 10.2.5 on Rack 5 on
Friday, May 28 @ 3-4pm.
@channel Hi, maintenance scheduled for
Switch IP 10.2.5 on Rack 5 on Friday,
May 28 @ 3-4pm.

13. Premise:
We are the Network admins at the company ACME and we’re
planning on doing maintenance on a switch on a Friday afternoon.
Sys Admins
(Servers & Other Hardware)
Network Admins
(In Charge of Switch)
The Telephone Game

14. Premise:
We are the Network admins at the company ACME and we’re
planning on doing maintenance on a switch on a Friday afternoon.
Network Admins
Sys Admins
App Admins 10+
(Marketo, SalesForce, Publishing Tools etc.)
(Servers & Other Hardware)
(In Charge of Switch)
The Telephone Game

15. Premise:
We are the Network admins at the company ACME and we’re
planning on doing maintenance on a switch on a Friday afternoon.
Network Admins
Sys Admins
App Admins
Internal Users
10+
(Marketo, SalesForce, Publishing Tools etc.)
(Employees in Sales, Marketing, Legal, HR, etc)
(Servers & Other Hardware)
(In Charge of Switch)
500+
The Telephone Game

16. Network Admins
Sys Admins
App Admins
Customers
Internal Users
10+
(Marketo, SalesForce, Publishing Tools etc.)
(Employees in Sales, Marketing, Legal, HR, etc)
(Servers & Other Hardware)
(In Charge of Switch)
500+
10’000+
The Telephone Game
Premise:
We are the Network admins at the company ACME and we’re
planning on doing maintenance on a switch on a Friday afternoon.

17. Dependency Analysis
Demo

18. Who’s using Neo4j?
In Network & IT-Management

19. Background
• Airline and Travel reservation system
• Used by almost all airlines
• 15th largest company, USD 5bn revenue
• 40 offices and 15,000 staff
Business Problem & Solution
• Management of a large, dynamic IT infrastructure
• Lots of different sources
• Different users with different questions
• Ingest data from sources into Neo4j
• Build interactive UI with free and canned queries
• Access Management
Amadeus IT Operations
41
diginomica.com/2018/03/06/amadeus-travels-across-enterprise/

20. Background
• New Relic delivers (APM) as a SaaS product.
• Cloud offering is an integral tool for developers, IT
ops teams, and executives
• easily view and analyze massive amounts of data,
• gain actionable insights in real-time
• Ward Cunningham is a Staff Engineer at NR
Business Problem & Solution
• Project Upscale enabled self empowered teams
• Need to record who works where on what
• Which systems are involved and needed
• Ingest data from 15+ systems into a cohesive
Graph View
NewRelic IT Operations
42
infoq.com/news/2017/09/el-dorado-released

21. Background
• Lending Club is the world’s largest credit
marketplace
• Shaking up the financial services industry
• also trying to shake up the financial technology
space
• We started this as a hobby, and now it’s running
our infrastructure of a publicly traded company.
Business Problem
• Manage all the infrastructure of a dynamic startup
• Availability for deployment
• Failure impact
• Microservices dependencies
• Virtual Services, Application Pools
LendingClub FINANCE
43
neo4j.com/blog/managing-microservices-neo4j/

22. Internet of Things
Business Problem
• Support complex operational infrastructure
collects, records and manages weather data
across a wide network
• Integrate with Splunk system that monitors
remote instruments
• Use graphs to query instrument network
Solution and Benefits
• Neo4j analyzes dependency graphs to produce
exception reports
• Neo4j and SPLUNK integrated tightly
• Solution has enabled KNMI to re-architect and
rebuild their entire operational infrastructure
Background
• The Royal Netherlands Meteorological
Institute (KNMI)
• Dutch national service with 1100+ weather
measurement locations
• Monitors and forecasts weather, climate,
air quality and seismic activity
Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute
SCIENCES
44

23. Thank you!