JUNOS High Availability

Simple Network Management Protocol

When logging is a passive endeavor, the collection stations merely sit, waiting for messages to be forwarded by the network devices. Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) provides an active exchange of information between network management stations and the network equipment. Building on the foundation of basic well-planned syslog architecture, SNMP can be used to gather and monitor information concerning high availability.

SNMP Overview

If you read RFC 1157, “A Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP),” you might wonder why it’s considered a “simple” network management protocol. However, a closer look at the actual implementation and use of SNMP reveals that it is a fairly simple protocol. The protocol relies on the use of SNMP agents within the networking equipment; these agents understand a common data set and report it to a collection or Network Management Station (NMS). Within SNMP, the agent can both receive and transmit data, thus allowing the NMS to actively pull information from the devices throughout the network. To ensure that equipment from multiple vendors can work with an NMS, the data for managing network equipment is designed into a standardized hierarchy called the Management Information Base (MIB). The MIB uses a tree-based structure: similar data objects are grouped together, and each leaf of the tree is labeled with an Object Identifier (OID).

Using OIDs to identify the information to be processed, SNMP communicates between ...