[PLUG] How to Detect Unmanaged Switches?

[Casey Bralla <MailList@nerdworld.org>]

I've been playing around with some python code I wrote to monitor my 
home/small business network.   I basically want to detect whenever any of my 
very low cost hardware (ie cheap sh*t) goes south and needs to be rebooted.


I can ping known devices and retrieve things like internal web pages to verify 
the device is working, but I've got several dumb switches that have started to 
age and occasionally go off-line.   I can detect the absence of devices on the 
other side of the switch, but I'd like to see if the switch itself is dead.

The switch won't ever respond to pings (since it has no IP address).


is there a utility like nmap that will seek out arp addresses or some other 
information that will let me know if a dumb switch is on line?
-- 

Casey Bralla

Chief Nerd in Residence
The NerdWorld Organisation
www.NerdWorld.org
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