Automated discovery and forwarding of relevant network traffic with respect to newly connected network tools for network tool optimizers

Abstract

Network tool optimizers and related methods are disclosed that provide automated discovery and configuration of network tool devices. The disclosed embodiments include tool processors having tool discovery engines and tool configuration engines that provide discovery of tool information and generation of rules for filter engines within the network tool optimizer (NTO) so that relevant network traffic received by the NTO is forwarded to network tool devices connected to the NTO. New network traffic sources connected to the NTO can also be automatically configured to forward relevant traffic to the network tool devices based upon the discovered tool information. Further, a database of tool information can be stored within the NTO and can be used by the NTO in determining relevant traffic for connected tool devices. A variety of different implementations can use the automatic tool discovery and configuration embodiments.