SNMP & RMON Management. TKH Security Solutions XSNet S4104 SW (EOL), XSNet S4104 SW

XSNet S4104SW/S4108SW

SNMP & RMON Management

This chapter describes the switch’s Simple Network

Management Protocol (SNMP) and Remote Monitoring

(RMON) capabilities.

Overview

RMON is an abbreviation for the Remote Monitoring MIB

(Management Information Base). RMON is a system defined by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) document RFC

2819, which defines how networks can be monitored remotely.

RMONs typically consist of two components: an RMON probe and a management workstation:

-

The RMON probe is an intelligent device or software agent that continually collects statistics about a LAN segment or VLAN. The RMON probe transfers the collected data to a management workstation on request or when a pre-defined threshold is reached.

-

The management workstation collects the statistics that the RMON probe gathers. The workstation can reside on the same network as the probe, or it can have an in-band or out-of-band connection to the probe.

The switch provides RMON capabilities that allow network administrators to set parameters and view statistical counters defined in MIB-II, Bridge MIB, and RMON MIB. RMON activities are performed at a Network Management Station running an SNMP network management application with graphical user interface.

25

XSNet S4104SW/S4108SW

SNMP Agent and MIB-2 (RFC 1213)

The SNMP Agent running on the switch manager CPU is responsible for:

Retrieving MIB counters from various layers of software modules according to the SNMP GET/GET NEXT frame messages.

-

Setting MIB variables according to the SNMP SET frame message.

Generating an SNMP TRAP frame message to the Network Management

Station if the threshold of a certain MIB counter is reached or if other trap conditions (such as the following) are met:

WARM START

COLD START

LINK UP

LINK DOWN

AUTHENTICATION FAILURE

RISING ALARM

FALLING ALARM

TOPOLOGY ALARM

MIB-II defines a set of manageable objects in various layers of the TCP/IP protocol suites. MIB-II covers all manageable objects from layer 1 to layer 4, and, as a result, is the major

SNMP MIB supported by all vendors in the networking industry. The switch supports a complete implementation of

SNMP Agent and MIB-II.

RMON MIB (RFC 2819) and Bridge MIB (RFC

1493)

The switch provides hardware-based RMON counters in the switch chipset. The switch manager CPU polls these counters periodically to collect the statistics in a format that complies with the RMON MIB definition.

26

XSNet S4104SW/S4108SW

RMON Groups Supported

The switch supports the following RMON MIB groups defined in RFC 2819:

RMON Statistics Group – maintains utilization and error statistics for the switch port being monitored.

-

RMON History Group – gathers and stores periodic statistical samples from the previous Statistics Group.

-

RMON Alarm Group – allows a network administrator to define alarm thresholds for any MIB variable. An alarm can be associated with Low

Threshold, High Threshold, or both. A trigger can trigger an alarm when the value of a specific MIB variable exceeds a threshold, falls below a threshold, or exceeds or falls below a threshold.

-

RMON Event Group – allows a network administrator to define actions based on alarms. SNMP Traps are generated when RMON Alarms are triggered. The action taken in the Network Management Station depends on the specific network management application.

Bridge Groups Supported

The switch supports the following four groups of Bridge MIB (RFC 1493):

The dot1dBase Group – a mandatory group that contains the objects applicable to all types of bridges.

-

The dot1dStp Group – contains objects that denote the bridge’s state with respect to the Spanning Tree Protocol. If a node does not implement the

Spanning Tree Protocol, this group will not be implemented. This group is applicable to any transparent only, source route, or SRT bridge that implements the Spanning Tree Protocol.

The dot1dTp Group – contains objects that describe the entity’s transparent bridging status. This group is applicable to transparent operation only and

SRT bridges.

-

The dot1dStatic Group – contains objects that describe the entity’s destination-address filtering status. This group is applicable to any type of bridge which performs destination-address filtering.

27