OpenView Network Node Manager: Designing and Implementing an Enterprise Solution

The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle of SNMP Polling

Practitioners in the field of quantum mechanics appreciate the famous Heisenberg uncertainty principle which states that it is not possible to determine simultaneously and exactly the position and momentum coordinates of a particle. The product of the two uncertainties is always greater than a minimum value approximately the size of Planck’s constant (6.6256x10^-34). Quantum physicists know this is because the act of measurement disturbs the process being measured.

Network managers don’t have a formal-sounding principle to explain it, but you know that using SNMP management software on a network disturbs it. Polling the network at a rate that lets us measure its real behavior disturbs it so ...