ZyXEL Communications ISG50 User Manual

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 Chapter 52 System
ISG50 User’s Guide
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one (SNMPv1) and version two (SNMPv2c). The next figure illustrates an SNMP management 
operation.   
Figure 478   
SNMP Management Model
An SNMP managed network consists of two main types of component: agents and a manager. 
An agent is a management software module that resides in a managed device (the ISG50). An 
agent translates the local management information from the managed device into a form 
compatible with SNMP. The manager is the console through which network administrators perform 
network management functions. It executes applications that control and monitor managed 
devices. 
The managed devices contain object variables/managed objects that define each piece of 
information to be collected about a device. Examples of variables include such as number of 
packets received, node port status etc. A Management Information Base (MIB) is a collection of 
managed objects. SNMP allows a manager and agents to communicate for the purpose of accessing 
these objects.
SNMP itself is a simple request/response protocol based on the manager/agent model. The 
manager issues a request and the agent returns responses using the following protocol operations:
• Get - Allows the manager to retrieve an object variable from the agent. 
• GetNext - Allows the manager to retrieve the next object variable from a table or list within an 
agent. In SNMPv1, when a manager wants to retrieve all elements of a table from an agent, it 
initiates a Get operation, followed by a series of GetNext operations. 
• Set - Allows the manager to set values for object variables within an agent. 
• Trap - Used by the agent to inform the manager of some events.