MPLS Network Management

9

NetFlow Accounting

“Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.”

–Albert Einstein

Introduction

NetFlow technology provides an efficient and scalable means for metering flow-based network traffic. The information captured by NetFlow can later be aggregated by a NetFlow collector and then fed into offline applications including network traffic accounting, usage-based network billing, network capacity planning, network monitoring, and data mining capabilities. Vendors such as Cisco Systems and Juniper Networks offer a variety of devices that produce NetFlow data records that can be exported for use by offline NetFlow-aware management stations and applications, or aggregated by NetFlow-based collection ...