Visualize network dependencies

This page describes how to visualize network dependencies between discovered server assets in Migration Center. You can view a graph showing network connections for a specific group or subset of server assets to help you understand your infrastructure and plan your application migration.

Visualization is based on the network connection data collected during discovery. The graph includes connections to server assets in other groups, as well as connections to unknown server assets external to your environment. You can access dependency visualization from the following pages:

Before you begin

Before you can visualize network dependencies for your server assets, collect network dependency data using the discovery client and sync it with Migration Center, or use the mcdc CLI to perform guest discovery and export data to Migration Center.

Migration Center identifies connections to discovered server assets, manually imported server assets, or unknown server assets external to your environment. For more information, see Start an asset discovery.

Limitations

Network dependency visualization has the following limitations:

  • You can only visualize network dependencies for server assets. Migration Center collects network dependencies data only for servers.
  • You can visualize up to 10 groups and up to 10,000 server assets in total. If you select more server assets or groups, or if the selected server assets have a large number of network connections, you might experience slower performance when visualizing the graph.

Visualize your server asset network relationships

To visualize your server asset network relationships, follow these steps:

  1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Create reports page.

    Go to Create reports

  2. Click Network relations visualization.

  3. Click Groups to visualize dependencies for one or more groups, or click Servers to visualize dependencies for one or more server assets.

  4. From the table, select the items you want to visualize.

  5. Click Visualize.

    The network dependency graph is displayed.

  6. To view information about a server asset, hold the pointer over the server asset. You can see the following information:

    • Node type
    • Connected nodes
    • Total number of inbound and outbound connections
    • IP address

  7. To view more details about a server asset, click it. In the details pane, you can perform the following actions:

    • To view the network connections of the selected server asset, click Network.
    • To view the asset inventory information, click Properties.
    • To export the asset inventory details, click Export and select a file format.

  8. Optional: Filter the graph based on the following criteria:

    • Groups: to hide groups from the graph, in the Groups section, clear the checkbox for a group.
    • Network
      • Assets without network connections: hide assets that have been discovered but have no observed network traffic.
      • Unscanned devices: hide connections to devices that are not discovered but are communicating with discovered assets.
      • Show connected assets: show assets that do not match other filters but are directly connected to assets that do.
    • Asset details
      • Detected software: from the Detected software list, select the software components to include in the graph.
      • Operating system: from the Operating system list, select the operating systems to include in the graph.

Visualize network dependencies for groups

To visualize network dependencies for a group, follow these steps:

  1. Go to the Groups page.

    Go to Groups

  2. From the list, select one or more groups to visualize.

  3. Click Visualize.

    The network dependency graph is displayed. The graph shows server assets as nodes and connections as edges.

  4. Optional: Filter the graph based on the following criteria:

    • Groups: to hide groups from the graph, in the Groups section, clear the checkbox for a group.
    • Network
      • Assets without network connections: hide assets that have been discovered but have no observed network traffic.
      • Unscanned devices: hide connections to devices that are not discovered but are communicating with discovered assets.
      • Show connected assets: show assets that do not match other filters but are directly connected to assets that do.
    • Asset details
      • Detected software: from the Detected software list, select the software components to include in the graph.
      • Operating system: from the Operating system list, select the operating systems to include in the graph.

Visualize network dependencies for specific server assets

To visualize network dependencies for specific server assets, follow these steps:

  1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Assets page.

    Go to Assets

  2. Select the server assets for which you want to view the network dependencies.

  3. Click Visualize.

    The network dependency graph is displayed. The graph shows server assets as nodes and connections as edges.

  4. Optional: Filter the graph based on the following criteria:

    • Detected software: from the Detected software list, select the software components to include in the graph.
    • Operating system: from the Operating system list, select the operating systems to include in the graph.

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