For several years, I’ve been telling myself that I need a proper network map. My network is definitely more complicated than it needs to be, but hey, I have an interest in it so it’s a bit of a hobby as well. I thought it would be cool to share some of this little project here to kick things off in this category!
(scroll down to jump to the pretty pictures 
)
If anyone here has looked for software or a service to create a network map, then they will know that literally all of the options out there are ugly. They might have the features (most of which I don’t need) but they don’t have the style.
A while ago I started to use Sketch to design some bits in the hope that one day I’d be able to find someone who would be willing to build it but last weekend my network basically collapsed and after a lot of consulting of hurriedly scrawled tables, lists and diagrams and yanking of devices from cabinets, following cables and so on trying to figure out what went where and why I’d made certain decisions years ago, I decided I’m just going to do the whole thing in Sketch and it then crossed my mind that if I set it up as a Prototype then I can pull it up on any device.
The good stuff
Port Icons
Originally, my plan was to build more of a topographical map which would essentially be a series of cards linking together and containing information so for this, I knew that I would need a selection of icons for ports.
Device Icons
Along with a selection of port icons, I would of course need a decent selection of device icons. I designed almost all of these (I think other than the HomePod and HomePod mini ones). I am particularly happy with the Raspberry Pi one 😆
Rack Components
At this point, I had decided that it would be nice to have a visual representation of a network cabinet and devices in it and so that led on to designing a bunch of components to represent everything that I needed.I have a mix of both black and silver devices in my rack so, along with being able to change various other things via Symbol Overrides, I configured these so that I could switch out the faceplate between matte black and silver aluminium (screws can also be switched out between black and silver).
For the Ubiquti items, I also added an extra component which lets me choose between the LED indicator and the OLED display on each device.
Information Cards
Really, the last piece of the puzzle was how to display information so I designed some Information Cards (one for patch panel ports, one for ports on a switch and the last for power sockets. I put together a bunch of smaller components within these so I can easily configure them via Overrides (and where necessary, expand on options without having to redesign anything).The Patch Panel card lets me see where both the cables in the back and front connect to.
The Switch Port Detail card lets me see what device (if any) is connected to a port and some relevant information such as the devices location, port number, IP Address (I use Static IP’s for most permanent devices on my network so these won’t need changing/updating), MAC addresses, where they’re connected, whether the have a Static or Dynamic IP and whether it’s a device powered through PoE.
Lastly, the Power Socket card just lets me see what is plugged in to each socket (if anything).
Interaction
The last piece of the puzzle is building an interactive prototype out of all of this. Sketch was great for this - super easy to setup and configure and so I've put together an example rack and a screen recording to show you where things are in their current state!
Conclusion
While I was previously looking for some software or a service that would tick all the boxes I had for this, the most highly recommended option for this was Microsoft Visio, which I've used a few times a long time ago but none of the examples I saw looked particularly great so I am happy that I've gone with this option (and it's also generated some feature requests of my own which I'm going to pass on to the team! 😄).I know that this is a bit of a niche use case, but sometimes the niche ones are more interesting so I’d be interested to know what you think!
P.S. I have some less niche other little fun projects I’ve been doing which I’ll share here very soon!
Edit: I realised it would be neat to see the original, real life version as well as the digital version
