Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is a widely used protocol from the Internet Protocol suite for monitoring the health and welfare of network attached devices.
SNMP standards are defined in a series of documents, called request for comments or RFCs, proposed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). There are currently three standards that have been adopted namely SNMP V1 (RFC 1157), SNMP V2c (RFC 1901) and more recently SNMP V3 (RFC 3411).
SNMP is an application layer protocol that is used by Network Management systems for monitoring network attached devices for operating and other conditions that warrant attention. The network attached devices can be anything that supports SNMP from Routers, Switches, Servers and even devices such as UPS (Un-interruptible Power Supplies).
SNMP's extensible design is based on Management Information bases (MIBs), which specify the management data of the device. There are standard MIBs defined by the internet community and vendor supplied MIBs for specific products. RMS Enterprise Monitor can load and use any MIB.
Many IT infrastructure related products support SNMP, for example UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supplies) systems, Air Conditioning and temperature control systems, Access control systems. RMS Enterprise Monitor can manage and report on any of these systems.
RMS Enterprise Monitor currently supports SNMP V1 and V2c. The development of SNMP V3 support is planned and will be reviewed based upon the user base uptake (Jan 2006).
