Hardware independent simple network management protocol based on a generic data collection scheme

• US 20080133765A1
• Filed: 01/16/2007
• Published: 06/05/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 12/01/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Avago Technologies International Sales Pte Limited (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: LSI Logic Corporation (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Roy, Somnath, Porel, Partha Protim, Sil, Tanmoy
• Granted Patent: US 8,880,578 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/230
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0213 Standardised network management protocols, e.g. simple network management protocol [SNMP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/08 Configuration management of networks or network elements address allocation H04L61/50
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0843 based on generic templates
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0853 by actively collecting configuration information or by backing up configuration information
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/34 involving the movement of software or configuration parameters network booting or remote initial program loading [RIPL] G06F9/4416

Abstract

A method and/or a system for a generic agent in a managed network are disclosed. In one embodiment, method of a generic simple network management protocol (SNMP) module on a network node includes communicating with a device succeedingly coupled to the network node using a data collector module assigned to the device and translating a data passed between the device and a management module managing the device based on a simple network management protocol. In another embodiment, a method of a data collector module associated with a SNMP module includes loading the data collector module based on at least an object name and a data collector module name defined in a configuration file and communicating with a device having an object matching the object name to access the object using the data collector module.

Claims

1. A method of a generic simple network management protocol (SNMP) module on a network node, comprising:

communicating with a device succeedingly coupled to the network node using a data collector module assigned to the device; and

translating a data passed between the device and a management module managing the device based on a simple network management protocol.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising processing a configuration file to fetch data of the device based on a query data of the management module.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the configuration file is stored in a platform independent file format including at least a XML format, an ini format, and a binary format.

4. The method of claim 3 further comprising collecting instances of an object of the device using the data collector module.

5. The method of claim 4 further comprising configuring the generic SNMP module to perform at least one of communicating a particular trap data to a particular device succeedingly coupled to the network node and traversing all devices subsequently coupled to the network node with the particular trap data.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the configuring the generic SNMP module is performed through encoding a trap scheme in the configuration file.

7. The method of claim 6 further comprising generating a new configuration file and a new data collector module of a new device when the new device is coupled to the network node.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein the generic SNMP module is agnostic to a change of a management information base (MIB) of the device.

9. The method of claim 1 in a form of a machine-readable medium embodying a set of instructions that, when executed by a machine, causes the machine to perform the method of claim 1.

10. A method of a data collector module associated with a generic simple network management protocol (SNMP) module, comprising:

loading the data collector module based on at least an object name and a data collector module name defined in a configuration file; and

communicating with a device having an object matching the object name to access the object using the data collector module.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein the data collector module is based on a simple object-oriented structure.

12. The method of claim 11 further comprising caching object instances of the object using the data collector module.

13. The method of claim 12 further comprising creating a thread associated with the data collector module to monitor an occurrence of an event in the device through a polling mechanism.

14. The method of claim 13 further comprising communicating an alert data to the generic SNMP module when a data associated with the occurrence exceeds a threshold value.

15. A system, comprising:

a management module to communicate a management data with a device coupled to the management module through a network;

a generic simple network management protocol (SNMP) module agnostic to a management information base (MIB) of the device to enable an interface between the management module and the device; and

a data collector module to access the device based on the management data when the generic SNMP module loads the data collector module.

16. The system of claim 15 wherein the data collector module is a plug-in which interacts with the generic SNMP module to process the management data.

17. The system of claim 16 further comprising a configuration module to select the data collector module of at least one of a particular device and a particular object of the particular device.

18. The system of claim 17 further comprising a trap module to generate a trap data associated with the device to alert the management module of an event exceeding a threshold value.

19. The system of claim 18 wherein the generic SNMP module and at least one non-generic SNMP module to concurrently operate on the device such that the at least one non-generic SNMP module operates in the device when the configuration file does not include information data of the device.

20. The system of claim 19 wherein the generic SNMP module is agnostic to a change in a MIB of each member of devices hosting the generic SNMP module such that the generic SNMP module provides a universal SNMP interface to the each member of devices.