Harry, What you're talking about falls under the realm of Systems / Network Management. Generally when you have large numbers of servers / devices to manage you need an effective tool. You can write your own scripts, but you'd just be duplicating the efforts of a number of available tools out there.
I'd suggest you read up on SNMP. And check out the following tools (google them): - net-snmp ( an SNMP agent ) - nagios ( very sophisticated network management tool ) - nmap ( good discovery tool ) - ntop ( traffic analysis, RMON agent, performance monitoring ) - sar ( system performance monitoring ) - argus (network performance monitornig) - rsync (distributed configurations, files etc.) - openssh (if you don't know what this is, you're in trouble) - rcs, cvs or subversion (change control) There are also a number of commercial tools availabe, but the above list encompasses most of what you will need. Hope this helps, Mohit. -- Mohit Muthanna, CISSP mohit (at) muthanna (uhuh) com "There are 10 types of people. Those who understand binary, and those who don't." _______________________________________________ Full-Disclosure - We believe in it. Charter: http://lists.netsys.com/full-disclosure-charter.html
