Create and Map Device Group

A Device Group is a collection of devices or interfaces configured with the same routing protocol or categorized by certain logical conditions. You can use device groups to organize network devices and interfaces depending on your network scale. Device Groups can be used as device input in the NetBrain Automation Functions.

There are the following types of device groups:

• My Device Groups — contains private device groups only accessible to you. To share a private device group as public, see Sharing a device group for details.
• Shared Device Groups — contains device groups accessible to all users in the current domain.
• Policy Device Groups — contains device groups used for Defining Device Access Policy.
• System Device Groups— contains the system built-in device groups generated after the routing protocol calculation for the discovered devices. Every system device group collects devices configured with the same routing protocol and AS number and is also named with the routing protocol and the AS number, such as #EIGRP 100. The device groups in this category are not intended to be modified or deleted.
• Media — contains the media used to connect interfaces of multiple devices (multi-point) in a specific topology type, including WAN, DMVPN, MPLS Cloud, bus, and so on. For example, a LAN segment in IPv4 L3 topology. The device groups in this category are not intended to be modified or deleted.

Tip: If you wish to modify the System Device Groups and Media, contact NetBrain Support.

Note: Only the users with the privilege of Shared Resource Management can create, edit or delete a device group in the Public category.

What is the difference between a device group and a site?

A Site reflects the actual network architecture and is typically used to represent the physical or logical layout of a network. In contrast, a device group offers more flexibility and allows users to group devices based on specific tasks or operational needs. A device can belong to only one leaf site but can belong to multiple device groups. 

For example, if you need to run a CLI command on devices that span multiple sites, you can create a device group containing those devices. Device groups can also be used as input for various NetBrain Automation features, such as Runbooks, Network Intents, and Benchmarks.