SNMP Manager Programmer's Guide

Introduction to Manager Services
SNMP Manager Programmer’s Guide–134249
1-5
The SNMP Manager
sending the trap and the contents of the notification, and may contain one or more
variable bindings.
SNMP managers must be able to construct and interpret packets of various types and
describe and interpret the numeric identifiers and values of MIB objects.
The SNMP Manager
The main job of the SNMP manager is to facilitate the monitoring and control of
network resources.
Primary Role
In most cases, a manager is responsible for a very specific collection of resources and is
designed to promote reasonable, logical, and effective management of those particular
resources. Some managers, known as MIB browsers, let users explore MIBs randomly
or in a serial fashion. The most useful managers help a user effectively manage a
specific collection of resources.
Figure 1-3
summarizes the major activities performed by an SNMP manager and
highlights which activities receive support from Manager Services.
•
User interface management logic interacts with a human or programmatic user.
This logic accepts queries and commands regarding resources and returns
information about resources. It defines how to represent information in response
and trap packets, often performing data aggregation, comparison, and other analyses
and operations to represent information meaningfully.
Figure 1-3. Activities of SNMP Managers
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MIB
Object
Handling
SNMP
Packet
Encoding/
Decoding
SNMP
Packet
Transmission/
Receipt
SNMP
Packet
Construction/
Interpretation
User
Interface
Management
Request
Packets
Trap Packets
Response
Packets
Manager Services Support
Resource Management
Queries and Commands
Resource Management
Information