- The five areas comprising network management are configuration management, fault management, performance management, accounting management, and security management.
- Configuration management is concerned with the physical or logical changes of network entities. It includes the reconfiguration and documentation of hardware, software, and user accounts.
- Fault management is concerned with the proper operation of each network component. It can be reactive or proactive.
- Performance management is concerned with the monitoring and control of the network to ensure the network runs as efficiently as possible. It is quantified by measuring the capacity, traffic, throughput, and response time.
- Security management is concerned with controlling access to the network.
- Accounting management is concerned with the control of user access to network resources through charges.
- Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is a framework for managing devices in an internet using the TCP/IP protocol suite.
- A manager, usually a host, controls and monitors a set of agents, usually routers.
- The manager is a host that runs the SNMP client program.
- The agent is a router or host that runs the SNMP server program.
- SNMP frees management tasks from both the physical characteristics of the managed devices and the underlying networking technology.
- SNMP uses the services of two other protocols: Structure of Management Information (SMI) and Management Information Base (MIB).
- SMI names objects, defines the type of data that can be stored in an object, and encodes the data.
- SMI objects are named according to a hierarchical tree structure.
- SMI data types are defined according to Abstract Syntax Notation 1 (ASN.l).
- SMI uses Basic Encoding Rules (BER) to encode data.
- MIB is a collection of groups of objects that can be managed by SNMP.
- MIB uses lexicographic ordering to manage its variables.
- SNMP functions in three ways: 1. A manager can retrieve the value of an object defined in an agent. 2. A manager can store a value in an object defined in an agent. 3. An agent can send an alarm message to the manager.
- SNMP defines eight types of packets: GetRequest, GetNextRequest, SetRequest, GetBulkRequest, Trap, InformRequest, Response, and Report.
- SNMP uses the services ofUDP on two well-known ports, 161 and 162.
- SNMPv3 has enhanced security features over previous versions.
Reference – Data Communications and Networking by Behrouz A. Forouzan (Author)
