After installation of Netipam (Install), access is via http://<host-ip>:7088

Upon launching Netipam the first time, you will be prompted to setup your admin user login.  You can add additional admin users in settings, as well as add users with other permission roles, such as "editor" and "viewer" users.  More information on this is in the settings section

Once you have created an admin user and have logged in, perform the following for the initial setup:
 

• Click on the gear icon in the top right and navigate to "settings"

• In the top section labeled "UniFi Connection", enter your UniFi gateway access URL.  At this time, there are two options for UniFi access, API key or user/pass authentication.  The API key method is new and will soon replace the user/pass method.  If user/pass method is used, enter username, and password.  It is highly recommended to setup a dedicated user in UniFi with local access and view only permissions to the Network application if using this method.  The API key is recommended, and you can easily setup an API key in UniFi Network (10.1.84+).  Site name is usually left as "default"

• For now, make sure the "Enable Updater" under UniFi Updater is disabled.  We will come back to this section later.

• Click "Test UniFi Connection" to make sure Netipam has access to UniFi.  If it fails, check your username and password, and make sure Netipam has access to the UniFi gateway IP address (Check firewall)

• Click on "Import" in the left navigation menu

• On the "Import Subnets" tab, click the button labeled "Load Subnets Preview"

• A list of your subnets setup in UniFi will show.  All subnets, including VPNs will show.

• Select the subnets that want to import into Netipam

• Press "Commit" to import the subnets

• Next, click on the "Import Unifi Devices" tab, and click on the "Load Devices Preview".

• A list of your UniFi devices will show, such as your gateway/router, network switches and wireless access points.

• Select the devices you want to import into Netipam.  Typically you will want to import all devices.

• Press "Commit" to import the UniFi devices

• Next, click on the "Import Clients" tab, and click on the button labeled "Load Clients Preview"

• You will want to comb through this list carefully.  By default, Netipam does not select offline clients, however you may still want to import offline clients.  UniFi can sometimes have old devices that do not exist any longer as "offline" clients, you likely would not want to import those.  Go through thie list and select all clients that need to be imported.  It is possible some that you do not import could get detected as new devices later, but you will have the option to ignore them if you do not want them import into Netipam.

• Once you have selected all clients you want to import, press the "Commit" button.

• Go back to the settings page (via the gear icon in the upper right) and enable the UniFi Updater.  This will start the process of tracking changes and status of clients and devices.

• By default, the only fields set to update changes when the updater runs are Online Status, Connection + Upstream, and Ip Address since these are not usually manually entered or changed.  It is best to leave these as is, however the other fields can be enabled to update when the updater runs but this will over write those fields if you have manually entered data in those fields.  

• You now have the basic building blocks in place, now you will now need to do your "After Initial Setup & Import" to get your network map and topology in place.

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After doing the initial setup and imports from UniFi, it is time to start defining client types.

Client types can be accessed using the gear icon in the upper right.

Netipam comes with a few predefined client types already in place, such as Gateway/Router, Network Switch, Access Point,and more.

Some typical examples of client types you might add:

- PC

- Laptop

- Proxmox Server

- NAS

- Proxmox VM

- Synology VM

- Hyper-V VM

- Proxmox LXC
- Docker Container

- Printer

- Mobile Phone

- WiFi Switch

 

These are just examples, you can define client types that makes sense for your network.

Client types can also be set to determine if a client is a device, which segregates clients into devices and adds additional data features.  Devices can also be set as a "host", which will allow assigning clients to their respective host (ie: Assign Proxmox VMs and containers to the Proxmox Server).  This helps build the "hosts and guests" page, as well as refines the Network Topology to give a clearer picture of the network setup.  This is import since virtual machines will often report the same upstream device in UniFi (ie: network switch), which does not exactly give a clear picture of how things really are setup on the network. 

Once your client types are setup, you can start assigning the types to clients by going to the Clients page and using the edit icon to make changes.  You can also take this opportunity to add any other information for each client/device, such as Manufacturer, model, operating system, etc.  Remember from the initial setup, if a toggle for a field is turned on for the updater in settings, it will over write what you manually enter in those fields when the updater runs.

 

*** The key to having a fully functional and informative setup in netipam is getting your clients assigned to client types and designating which devices are hosts, then assigning the host for the guest clients.  When editing a client, all designated hosts will show up in the host dropdown, making it easy to establish host-guest relationships.  This, combined with upstream and connection data from UniFi will make for a great topology setup as well as allow easier toubleshooting through easier tracking and location of clients and devices when network issues arise. ***

  

 

Other settings you may want to review and change right away if needed are below:

 

- Topology root: This is a feature that is in place if you add a device that may not be directly on the network in UniFi, but should act as the Topology root (such as a modem in front of your gateway) or if you have a third party router.

 

- Critical Device: Devices can also be designated as "Critical Devices" in their settings, which will list these devices under Critical Devices on the Dashboard.  Critical devices are usually devices very important to the functionality of your network, such as gateway/routers, network switches, acess points, servers, etc.  Critical Device designation can be used for future features as well, such as critical alerts.

 

- Track Online Status: If a device on the network does not need to have the online status tracked or updated, this can turned off.  It is a good idea to turn this off for manually addedd "off network" devices, such as a bridged modem so it will not appear as "offline"

 

- Ignore Offline:  For clients or devices such as mobile phones that will be online/offline several times a day possibly, this can be turned on to prevent getting offline alerts eachtime the client or device goes offline.

 

- Monitor Mode: This feature is useful for devices that typically do not show up in UniFi, such as docker containers.  By changing this from the Normal (UniFi + Ping) to Ping + TCP Port, you can then track the status of the device by IP & port number (XX.XX.XX.XX:XX).  These tyoes of clients need to be added manually.

 

The dashboard gives a highlight of network statistics, information and alerts.

WAN Status - displays the Primary and Secondary WAN information (Status and IP), and the Active WAN (This can be turned on/off in settings)

 

Subnet Utilization - A quick overview of subnet utilization, showing IP utilization in charts for up to the first (10) subnets

 

Offline Alerts - If a client or device goes from online to offline, an offline alert will appear on the dashboard.  The alert wil stay on the dashboard until it is acknowledged.  If the client/device comes back online, the alert will remain but will show when it recovered.  This makes sure that clients/devices that may be going offline for short periods get noticed.  If offline alerts are not wanted for a client/device, like a mobile phone, it can be set to be ignored for offline status and alerts in it's settings.

 

Critical Devices - List of devices set as critical in their settings.  Allows easy visualization of devices that are considered critical to the functionality of the network.

 

New Clients/Devices - If a new client or device is discovered, it will appear here and give the option to add, edit & add, or ignore.

 

Subnets Overview - Subnet details showing the CIDR, quantity of UPs for Usable, Used, and Available.  The number clients, devices, and offline items per subnet is also shown.  You can click directly on the subnet name or CIDR to go directly to the Subnet details page for that subnet.

 

 

The Access Panel is a list of clients and devices that have access links defined.  When you click on a client or device, the access url will open in a new window.  The access tiles can be arranged into categories.  The categories can be defined by clicking on the lower gear icon in the top right.  You can also rearranged the tiles and categories by clicking on the sort icon to the left of the gear icon.

The access panel can can be the gateway to your network clients and devices.

 

List of all devices.  On the Devices page, the following information is displayed:

 

- Online status

- Name (If the device has an access link set, the name will be a clickable link)
- Type
- Hostname (as pulled from UniFi, can be edited)
- IP address
- Subnet (subnet name with a clickable link to the subnet details)

- MAC address

- Connection (wired or wifi, with colored code for 2.4GHz, 5GHz, or 6GHz).  Tooltip also gives SSID

- Upstream device (Gateway or switch (with port number), access point (with SSID and GHz)

- Location

- Rack (Rack name, position and size)

- Asset #

- Manufacturer
- Model
- Operating System

- Source (source when acquired)

- Used/New (Used or new when acquired)

- Acquire date (this helps easily give an idea of a devices age)

- Edit, history and delete options

 

The history option shows the online/offline history of each device, with a 30 day chart and timeline for each 24 hour period from the past 30 days.  There is also a list of status events from the past 30 days detailing when the device went online and offline.  The history view also gives an IP history for a device showing what IPs the device has utilized.

 

By clicking on the "export" icon in the top right (arrow pointing down), you have a choice to export devices, or export all.

Export devices exports the device information (all columns, visible or not).  The Export all will export clients, devices, subnets, and a list of all used IP addresses and what they are assigned to.

 

The devices page also has many options to filter and search devices.  You can also hide/show columns by clicking the column icon just to the left of the Add Device buton.

 

List of all clients.  On the Clients page, the following information is displayed:

 

- Online status

- Name (If the client has an access link set, the name will be a clickable link)
- Type
- Hostname (as pulled from UniFi, can be edited)
- IP address
- Subnet (subnet name with a clickable link to the subnet details)

- MAC address

- Connection (wired or wifi, with colored code for 2.4GHz, 5GHz, or 6GHz).  Tooltip also gives SSID

- Upstream device (Gateway or switch (with port number), access point (with SSID and GHz)

- Host (if a guest and assigned to a host, the is definable in client's settings)

- Location

- Rack (Rack name, position and size)

- Asset #

- Manufacturer
- Model

- Edit, history and delete options

 

The history option shows the online/offline history of each client, with a 30 day chart and timeline for each 24 hour period from the past 30 days.  There is also a list of status events from the past 30 days detailing when the client went online and offline.  The history view also gives an IP history for a device showing what IPs the client has utilized.

 

By clicking on the "export" icon in the top right (arrow pointing down), you have a choice to export clients, or export all.

Export clients exports the client information (all columns, visible or not).  The Export all will export clients, devices, subnets, and a list of all used IP addresses and what they are assigned to.

 

The clients page also has many options to filter and search devices.  You can also hide/show columns by clicking the column icon just to the left of the Add Client buton.

The Subnets page details the subnets setup on your network. 

- Subnet name
- CIDR

- IP usable range
- Number of usable IP addresses 
- Number of used IP addresses 
- Number of clients utilizing IP addresses 

- Number of devices utilizing IP addresses
- Number of offline clients/devices

- DHCP Range

- VLAN ID

- DNS

- Next Free IPs (outside of reserved or DHCP).  Next 3 free IPs are listed
- Description

- Edit and Delete icons

 

Each subnet can then be viewed in detail with the full IP address list, showing what client/device is utilizing each IP, or if the IP is reserved, DHCP or available for use.  Each client/device also displays it's current online status.

Users can also manually add a client/device from the IP address page, which will automatically assign it to that IP in Netipam.  Netipam does not make any changes in UniFi !

 

There are export options to Excel.

- IP usable range

The Host and Guest pages displays a list of devices that are set as a host and their guest clients.  The online status of the hosts and guests is also shown, along with the following information for each guest client:

 

- Online status

- Name (If the device has an access link set, the name will be a clickable link)

- Hostname

- Type

- IP address

 

The Network Topology Page give a hierarchy of your network setup, allowing you drill down into your network layer by layer.  By default, Netipam uses your Gateway/Router as the parent device but you do have manual control for situations where you may have a modem that is not directly part of the UniFi network (it can be manually added as a parent device) or if you ahve more than one gateway/router.  

Each client/device shows the following:

 

- Online status

- Connection to upstream device (Wifi with tooltip details or port number)

- Name (If the device has an access link set, the name will be a clickable link)

- Type
- IP address

 

The network topology has an export option to Excel

 

Import data directly from your UniFi gateway.  Netipam utilizes a local view-only user so access to UniFi is controlled and safe.  Netipam then checks for client and device changes on a defined interval to keep the data up to date.  This allows offline alerts and new device alerts on the dashboard.

Each time the updater runs, a log is recorded to record any changes, if any.  The updater log view allows users to see what changes occured and when.

IP History for devices and clients

Netipam Settings

- UniFi connection settings (url, user, password)

- Enable/Disable UniFi updater

- Updater interval (seconds).  If you see "403 error", try raising the interval by 30 or 60 seconds.

- Selective options for which client/device data fields will be updated by the updater.  This allows you to do manual entries and not have them overwritten by the updater.

- Ability to manually run the updater (even if the automatic updater is not enabled)

- UI refresh interval (helps to force data changes)

- Show/Hide WAN status on dashboard

- Date format

- Application name

- Theme

- Light/Dark mode (in app bar at top of pages)

 

- Backup (full Netipam backup)

- Restore (full restore from backup, will overwrite existing users and may require user to login again)

- Reset Imported Data - This will delete imported data (devices/clients/subnets, updater logs access ordering) but will keep users, settings, and configurations like client types, locations, racks and access categories.

 

Netipam has the ability to set defined client types which allows clients to be defined as a device, and also allows easy search and filter by type.

Network devices imported from UniFI anotmatically get assigned proper predefined types such as Gateway/Router, Network Switch, and Access Point.

The client types can added/edited by clicking on the gear icon in the upper right, and selecting "client types"

 

Some suggested client types:

 

- PC

- Laptop

- Proxmox Server (set as host, set as device)

- NAS (set as host if used for VMs or docker/containers, set as device)

- Windows Server (possible a host if using Hyper-V, set as device)

- Proxmox LXC

- Proxmox VM

- WiFi Switch

- WiFi Receptacle

- Smart Light

- Mobile Phone

- Tablet

- Printer

 

These are just suggestions, but gives you an idea of the power of client types.  Setup your client types and devices to suit your network environment.  Try to visualize what information about a client or device will help you the most.

For example, you get an offline alert on the dashboard.  What information would be beneficial?  What is it and where is it will help tremendously to start the troubleshooting.

 

Netipam has the ability to assign locations to clients and devices.  Locations are defined by the user.

Clients and devices can be assigned to a rack.  Racks are defined by the user, and details down to position and size are able to be defined for every client device in in a rack.  The Rack page also gives a visualization of each rack.

Predefined user roles to limit access of users based on their role

- Admin (full access for adding, editing and deleting)

- Editor (Can add/edit/delete, but cannot reset or recover backups)

- Viewer (view access only, no ability to add/edit/delete or access settings page)