If the hostnames that you would use don't need to be super descriptive or match the actual device's hostname, you could easily just generate a list of hosts file entries for the entire subnet(s) that contain the IP as part of the hostname.
e.g:
127.0.0.1 localhost 192.168.1.1 192-168-1-1.domain.tld 192.168.1.2 192-168-1-2.domain.tld etc...
If you would prefer to have the actual device hostnames used, I think the best course of action would be to write a script that can scan the ranges, connect to and query the hostname from responding IPs, and dump it into a hosts file on your observium server. Depending on how many different types of devices you have, this may or may not be practical, since you would presumably need to create a slightly different subroutine/function for each type.
If you actually want the devices to have a real DNS record, you may be able to use a similar script to push dynamic updates to your DNS server, but it really depends on your specific setup.
I am not aware of any existing, "generic" server-side subnet scanner + dynamic DNS updater, but a script such as the above would be a "non-generic", and is certainly feasible.
To me, since your current monitoring solution doesn't care about hostnames, and you (seemingly) don't have any need for DNS records outside of fulfilling Observium's requirement, I think the first option makes the most sense, by far.
On 01/28/2016 11:43 AM, Alasdair MacLeod wrote:
Hi Guys,
I am looking for the best way to update DNS on our network.
We are a WISP with around 10k devices.
Currently we do most of our monitoring with software which does not care about DNS and works via IP.
I have begun playing with Observium and really like.
In order to have the freedom to add devices to our Observium instance at will, we will have to level up our DNS game massively.
What solutions do people currently use to register hardware with DNS at the time of deployment? Is it possible for a DNS server to discover hardware (based on IP ranges we give it) and query for hostnames then add them to the database?
Thanks Guys
Alasdair
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