IBM 8271 Nways Ethernet LAN Switch, User Manual, Page: 132 / 210

7-2 C
HAPTER
7: RMON
What is RMON?
RMON is the common abbreviation for the Remote Monitoring MIB
(Management Information Base), a system defined by the IETF
documents RFC 1271 and RFC 1757, which allows you to monitor
LANs remotely.
A typical RMON setup consists of two components:
■
The RMON probe — An intelligent, remotely-controlled device or
software agent that continually collects statistics about a LAN
segment, and transfers the information to a management
workstation on request or when a pre-defined threshold is crossed.
■
The management workstation — Communicates with the RMON
probe and collects the statistics from it. The workstation does not
have to be on the same network as the probe and can manage the
probe by in-band or out-of-band connections.
The RMON Groups The IETF define nine groups of Ethernet RMON statistics. This section
describes these groups, and details how they can be used.
Statistics
The Statistics group provides traffic and error statistics showing packets,
bytes, broadcasts, multicasts and errors on a LAN segment.
Information from the Statistics group is used to detect changes in
traffic and error patterns in critical areas of your network.
History
The History group provides historical views of network performance by
taking periodic samples of the counters supplied by the Statistics group.
The group features user-defined sample intervals and bucket counters
for complete customization of trend analysis.
The group is useful for analysis of traffic patterns and trends on a LAN
segment, and to establish baseline information indicating normal
operating parameters.
F24user.bk Page 2 Wednesday, July 15, 1998 4:27 PM