This article has been contributed by Nir Dvir – an IT Manager and blogger.
This article aims to provide a common set of guidelines for handling large numbers of records in your IT environment. Applying naming conventions to IT records such as usernames, computer names, devices and other records will allow others to understand how assets are organised and structured.
For example if your environment is spread across multiple countries or domain names one way to differentiate between elements is to use suffix names. This article is related to prefix differentiation, which can be a problem in local environments or databases.
Not much attention is given to naming conventions in the IT environment, especially when starting out small. I remember my first network carried the names of characters from Joseph Heller’s novel, Catch-22. At first it was just for fun and it was very easy to remember Yossarian, Milo, Orr, and majorx4 (Major major major major). As my network got bigger, I ran out of funny name to choose, and things started to get complicated. I started using characters from the Greek, Roman and Viking mythology, till it became a nightmare. I had to come up with a method to help me identify nodes without remembering look-up tables in my head, so I started looking for some kind of common format. This would prove very useful when I used an asset management tool.
In large network it is very common to use some kind of database to store records. Be it an LDAP (such as Active Directory), Yellow Pages YP/NIS, a DNS, a DHCP or a CMDB. This is why it is necessary to keep in your environment unique values for records such as computer names, usernames, asset tags and email addresses, so you can differentiate between them.
Reasons for using naming conventions:
There are many ways to differentiate between elements, here are some examples:
Physical differentiation – by the location of the object such as:
Logical differentiation – by the relation of the object such as:
Here are some examples that might clarify naming conventions. First examples relate to users and employees names. I’ll use my domain as an example but it can be any domain. The primary objective is to have uniformity in the convention when selecting computer names, usernames, email addresses or any other identifies, as they may affect the use in an Identity management tool.
Let’s take John Doe For example, let’s say that John belongs to our Chicago office, his office is in building A, he works in the marketing group, and he has a laptop, a portable projector and a mobile phone.
His employee name – Should be recorded as John Doe, not john doe, John doe, Dow john, J0hN doW! or any other combination. If you have another John Doe in your company, you may use his middle initial or any other distinguishes.
Notes:
Now for John’s devices, a little background might help us decide on suitable names for his devices.
His devices might be named as:
His Laptop – chamkt-doej-lt
His Projector– chamkt-doej-pj
His Mobile Phone – chamkt-doej-mo
I used the following schema:
CH for the Chicago branch
A for building A
MKT for marketing
DOEJ for his username
MO for mobile, PJ for projector, LT his laptop.
Some other devices around John might be:
chamkt-prt1 – his departmental printer
chamkt-plt1 – his departmental plotter
chamkt-fs1 – his departmental file server
cha-sw-core1 – his building network core switches
ch-srv-ex1 – his branch exchange server
Other areas in IT where you can use naming conventions in a similar concept are:
Now remember, these are only examples. You should choose your own schema for your naming conventions as it best suites your organization. There are, however, some basic rules you should comply with.
Basic Rules
Other Guidelines
Some References:
Summary:
Naming records in a consistent and logical way will help distinguish between records in a glance. Naming records according to agreed conventions will make naming records much easier for all IT parties, it will streamline adoption of management application or new systems and allow a simple expansion of your organization.
This article has been contributed by Nir Dvir – an IT Manager and blogger.