IPAM (IP Address Management) software is important in medium and large network. It may be helpful in a small network depending on how you define small. There are several ways to manage IP addresses and the two well known ways are spreadsheet and IPAM software. Managing IP addresses on a spreadsheet can be a nightmare and provides no automation. IPAM software provides automation and an easy to use interface.
IPAM software ranges from zero dollars to thousands of dollars. If your organization has a budget for a paid version of IPAM, then it’s time for you to research and evaluate all the paid versions out there. If the money is tight, then you’re in luck since there are several free IPAM software out there and this article will concentrate on one of them, which is IPplan.
IPplan is a free (GPL), web based, multilingual, TCP IP address management (IPAM) software and tracking tool written in php 4, simplifying the administration of your IP address space. IPplan goes beyond TCPIP address management including DNS administration, configuration file management, circuit management (customizable via templates) and storing of hardware information (customizable via templates). IPplan can handle a single network or cater for multiple networks and customers with overlapping address space. Makes managing ip addresses and managing ip address space simple and easy!
In this tutorial, it assumes that you have and/or know the following:
- A physical machine or VM with at least 8GB HDD space and 512MB RAM
- How to install Ubuntu Linux Server Edition with LAMP
- How to use an editor in Linux environment
Here are the steps to implement IPAM software using IPplan:
Download and install current Ubuntu Linux Server Edition on a physical machine or virtual machine (VM). Do not forget about LAMP when it asks you what packages you want to be installed during the installation process.
Once done with the installation. Update your Ubuntu box. The step is optional, but I recommend you to update your software.
admin@ubuntu:~$ sudo apt-get update admin@ubuntu:~$ sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
Once your Ubuntu box has been updated, download IPplan from Sourceforge.
admin@ubuntu:~$ wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/iptrack/ipplan/Release%204.92/ipplan-4.92b.tar.gz?r=http%3A%2F%2Fsourceforge.net%2Fprojects%2Fiptrack%2Ffiles%2Fipplan%2FRelease%25204.92%2F&ts=1325009788&use_mirror=iweb
Once the download is complete, this will create a file on your home folder – in this case it is in /home/admin. The file is called ipplan-4.92b.tar.gz and with part of the URL. There maybe a way to download it and use a specific name instead of a long name, but unfortunately I do not know how to do it since I have a limited experience with wget command. My remedy is to just change the file name by using the command below.
admin@ubuntu:~$ mv ipplan* test.tar.gz
Once renamed, we need to untar (unzip in Windows term) the file. This tar file will unzip a directory called ipplan.
admin@ubuntu:~$ tar -xvzf test.tar.gz
We need to move the ipplan folder to its proper destination where Apache can access it.
admin@ubuntu:~$ sudo mv ipplan /var/www
We now need to create a database, in this tutorial the name of the database is ipplan. Once the command has been issued, it will ask you for the MySQL password. This is the password that you set up during the installation process.
admin@ubuntu:~$ mysqladmin -u root -p create ipplan
Using root to access database is not a good idea, so we need to create a user called ipplan to access the ipplan database.
admin@ubuntu:~$ mysql -u root -p ipplan
We now need to give all rights to ipplan user to modify and access the ipplan database.
mysql> grant all on ipplan.* to ipplan@localhost identified by 'put_your_ipplan_password_here';
Yes, the single (‘) quotation marks are included in the command. If you forget to put the single quotation marks, it will give you an error.
Reload the rights and exit.
mysql>flush privileges; mysql>exit
Change the config file of IPplan. Feel free to use your favorite Linux editor. This tutorial is using VI editor to edit configuration files.
admin@ubuntu:~$ sudo vi /var/www/ipplan/config.php
Find the following and change the value of DBF_PASSWORD.
define("DBF_TYPE", 'maxsql');
define("DBF_HOST", 'localhost');
define("DBF_USER", 'ipplan');
define("DBF_NAME", 'ipplan');
define("DBF_PASSWORD", 'put_your_ipplan_password_here');For security purposes, change the password of the IPplan’s admin account. If you exit out of the config.php, go back and look for
define("ADMINUSER", 'admin');
define("ADMINPASSWD", 'put_your_admin_password_here');
define("ADMINREALM", 'IPplan admin authentication');We need to change permissions to allow access to /var/www/ipplan directory.
admin@ubuntu:~$sudo chown -R www-data /var/www/ipplan admin@ubuntu:~$sudo chmod -R 750 /var/www/ipplan
You’re now done with the Linux CLI. We can now access the IPplan webpage by going to the URL below. See the screenshot below.
http://ipplan_ip_address_here/ipplan/admin/install.php
By default, the Upgrade option is selected and needs to be changed to New installation. Leave the Run the SQL Now option. Click Go. You will be asked for the IPplan admin user account. Once done, you will see a webpage just like the one below.
The IPplan is now installed and ready to be configured. To access the webpage, go to the URL below
http://ipplan_ip_address_here/ipplan
I hope this has been helpful and I thank you for reading!
Update: This still works under Ubuntu Server 12.04 LTS.
Reference
IPPLAN – The Easy Tutorial by OpenManiak
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