A tutorial on how to properly draw diagrams of complex network systems?

Question

Documentation

I would like to learn how to correctly and visually draw (just on a piece of paper for a start) schemes of rather complex (not so quantitatively as system-qualitatively) networks. With VPNs (despite the fact that the physical link is of no lesser semantic importance in the context), virtual machines (with and without their own real IP) on the same physical server, etc. If anyone knows, please give links to good articles on this topic. Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

The main thing is to have a good idea of ​​how the final system works (will work). Next - a matter of technology and experience. I recommend making diagrams in Visio, no matter how much I care about OpenSource, I draw diagrams in it. The skill of drawing beautiful and understandable diagrams will come with experience.

Answer 2

and maybe this controlsale.ru/?p=23 will help you

Answer 3

No matter how much I tried to use software products for the network / settings scheme, I always returned to the handwritten version.
As a result, several A3 sheets hung above the workplace, pinned to the drywall wall with buttons. Drawn and signed in pencil. In this case, the scheme is always easy to bring to the current state (eraser + pencil - to help).
How to display is up to you.
The main thing is to make it clear to you and your colleagues.
As an example, look at the diagrams in the manuals for configuring juniper or cisco devices.
And one more piece of advice: don't try to display everything in one diagram. Useless. At best, it will become unreadable, at worst, non-intuitive. It is better to break into separate schemes for projects / abstraction levels.
So in my case there were two network schemes:
- physical links
- vpn connection scheme
Their "combination" was achieved by naming devices / hosts / physical links common to all schemes.
At the same time, there was a separate table of firewall settings, which already indicated which ports were open between which hosts and why.