Operation Manual – SNMP-RMON
H3C S3100 Series Ethernet Switches
Chapter 1 SNMP Configuration
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Chapter 1 SNMP Configuration
1.1 SNMP Overview
The simple network management protocol (SNMP) is used for ensuring the
transmission of the management information between any two network nodes. In this
way, network administrators can easily retrieve and modify the information about any
node on the network. In the meantime, they can locate faults promptly and implement
the fault diagnosis, capacity planning and report generating.
As SNMP adopts the polling mechanism and provides basic function set, it is suitable
for small-sized networks with fast-speed and low-cost. SNMP is based on user
datagram protocol (UDP) and is thus widely supported by many products.
1.1.1 SNMP Operation Mechanism
SNMP is implemented by two components, namely, network management station
(NMS) and agent.
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An NMS can be a workstation running client program. At present, the commonly
used network management platforms include QuidView, Sun NetManager, IBM
NetView, and so on.
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Agent is server-side software running on network devices (such as switches).
An NMS can send GetRequest, GetNextRequest and SetRequest messages to the
agents. Upon receiving the requests from the NMS, an agent performs Read or Write
operation on the managed object (MIB, Management Information Base) according to
the message types, generates the corresponding Response packets and returns them
to the NMS.
When a network device operates improperly or changes to other state, the agent on it
can also send trap messages on its own initiative to the NMS to report the events.
1.1.2 SNMP Versions
Currently, SNMP agent on a switch supports SNMPv3, and is compatible with SNMPv1
and SNMPv2c.
SNMPv3 adopts user name and password authentication.
SNMPv1 and SNMPv2c adopt community name authentication. The SNMP packets
containing invalid community names are discarded. SNMP community name is used to
define the relationship between SNMP NMS and SNMP agent. Community name
functions as password. It can limit accesses made by SNMP NMS to SNMP agent. You
can perform the following community name-related configuration.