CMIP vs.

SNMP : Network Management

Imagine yourself as a network administrator, responsible for a 2000 user ne
twork.
This network reaches from California to New York, and some branches over seas.
In
this situation, anything can, and usually does go wrong, but it would be your jo
b as a
system administrator to resolve the problem with it arises as quickly as possibl
e. The
last thing you would want is for your boss to call you up, asking why you haven'
t done
anything to fix the 2 major systems that have been down for several hours. How
do
you explain to him that you didn't even know about it? Would you even want to te
ll
him that? So now, picture yourself in the same situation, only this time, you w
ere
using a network monitoring program. Sitting in front of a large screen displayi
ng a
map of the world, leaning back gently in your chair. A gentle warning tone sound
s, and
looking at your display, you see that California is now glowing a soft red in co
lor, in
place of the green glow just moments before. You select the state of California
, and it
zooms in for a closer look. You see a network diagram overview of all the compu
ters
your company has within California. Two systems are flashing, with an X on top
of
them indicating that they are experiencing problems. Tagging the two systems, yo
u
press enter, and with a flash, the screen displays all the statitics of the two
systems,
including anything they might have in common causing the problem. Seeing that b
oth
systems are linked to the same card of a network switch, you pick up the phone a
nd
give that branch office a call, notifying them not only that they have a problem
, but
how to fix it as well.
Early in the days of computers, a central computer (called a mainframe) was
connected to a bunch of dumb terminals using a standard copper wire. Not much
thought was put into how this was done because there was only one way to do it:
they
were either connected, or they weren't. Figure 1 shows a diagram of these early
systems. If something went wrong with this type of system, it was fairly easy to
troubleshoot, the blame almost always fell on the mainframe system.
Shortly after the introduction of Personal Computers (PC), came Local Area
Networks (LANS), forever changing the way in which we look at networked systems.
LANS originally consisted of just PC's connected into groups of computers, but s
oon
after, there came a need to connect those individual LANS together forming what
is
known as a Wide Area Network, or WAN, the result was a complex connection of
computers joined together using various types of interfaces and protocols. Figu
re 2
shows a modern day WAN. Last year, a survey of Fortune 500 companies showed tha
t
15% of their total computer budget, 1.6 Million dollars, was spent on network
management (Rose, 115). Because of this, much attention has focused on two fami
lies
of network management protocols: The Simple Network Management Protocol
(SNMP), which comes from a de facto standards based background of TCP/IP
communication, and the Common Management Information Protocol (CMIP), which
derives from a de jure standards-based background associated with the Open Syste
ms
Interconnection (OSI) (Fisher, 183).

In this report I will cover advantages and disadvantages of both Common

Management Information Protocol (CMIP) and Simple Network Management Protocol
(SNMP)., as well as discuss a new protocol for the future. I will also give som
e good
reasons supporting why I believe that SNMP is a protocol that all network
administrators should use.
SNMP is a protocol that enables a management station to configure, monitor,
and
receive trap (alarm) messages from network devices. (Feit, 12). It is formally
specified
in a series of related Request for Comment (RFC) documents, listed here.
RFC 1089 - SNMP over Ethernet
RFC 1140 - IAB Official Protocol Standards
RFC 1147 - Tools for Monitoring and Debugging TCP/IP
Internets and Interconnected Devices
[superceded by RFC 1470]
RFC 1155 - Structure and Identification of Management
Information for TCP/IP based internets.
RFC 1156 - Management Information Base Network
Management of TCP/IP based internets
RFC 1157 - A Simple Network Management Protocol
RFC 1158 - Management Information Base Network
Management of TCP/IP based internets: MIB-II
RFC 1161 - SNMP over OSI
RFC 1212 - Concise MIB Definitions
RFC 1213 - Management Information Base for Network Management
of TCP/IP-based internets: MIB-II
RFC 1215 - A Convention for Defining Traps for use with the SNMP
RFC 1298 - SNMP over IPX (SNMP, Part 1 of 2, I.1.)
The first protocol developed was the Simple Network Management Protocol
(SNMP). It was commonly considered to be a quickly designed "band-aid" solution
to
internetwork management difficulties while other, larger and better protocols we
re
being designed. (Miller, 46). However, no better choice became available, and S
NMP
soon became the network management protocol of choice.
It works very simply (as the name suggests): it exchanges network packets
through
messages (known as protocol data units (PDU)). The PDU contains variables that
have both titles and values. There are five types of PDU's which SNMP uses to
monitor a network: two deal with reading terminal data, two with setting termina
l data,
and one called the trap, used for monitoring network events, such as terminal st
art-ups
or shut-downs.
By far the largest advantage of SNMP over CMIP is that its design is simple
, so it is
as easy to use on a small network as well as on a large one, with ease of setup,
and lack
of stress on system resources. Also, the simple design makes it simple for the
user to
program system variables that they would like to monitor. Another major advanta
ge to
SNMP is that is in wide use today around the world. Because of it's development
during a time when no other protocol of this type existed, it became very popula
r, and
is a built in protocol supported by most major vendors of networking hardware, s
uch as
hubs, bridges, and routers, as well as majoring operating systems. It has even b
een put
to use inside the Coca-Cola machines at Stanford University, in Palo Alto, Calif
ornia
(Borsook, 48). Because of SNMP's smaller size, it has even been implemented in
such devices as toasters, compact disc players, and battery-operated barking dog
s. In
the 1990 Interop show, John Romkey, vice president of engineering for Epilogue,
demonstrated that through an SNMP program running on a PC, you could control a
standard toaster through a network (Miller, 57).
SNMP is by no means a perfect network manager. But because of it's simple
design, these flaws can be fixed. The first problem realized by most companies
is that
there are some rather large security problems related with SNMP. Any decent hac
ker
can easily access SNMP information, giving them any information about the networ
k,
and also the ability to potentially shut down systems on the network. The lates
t version
of SNMP, called SNMPv2, has added some security measures that were left out of
SNMP, to combat the 3 largest problems plaguing SNMP: Privacy of Data (to preve
nt
intruders from gaining access to information carried along the network), authent
ication
(to prevent intruders from sending false data across the network), and access co
ntrol
(which restricts access of particular variables to certain users, thus removing
the
possibility of a user accidentally crashing the network). (Stallings, 213)
The largest problem with SNMP, ironically enough, is the same thing that ma
de it
great; it's simple design. Because it is so simple, the information it deals wi
th is
neither detailed, nor well organized enough to deal with the growing networks of
the
1990's.
This is mainly due to the quick creation of SNMP, because it was never designed
to be
the network management protocol of the 1990's. Like the previous flaw, this on
e too
has been corrected with the new version, SNMPv2. This new version allows for mo
re
in-detail specification of variables, including the use of the table data struct
ure for
easier data retrieval. Also added are two new PDU's that are used to manipulate
the
tabled objects. In fact, so many new features have been added that the formal
specifications for SNMP have expanded from 36 pages (with v1) to 416 pages with
SNMPv2. (Stallings, 153) Some people might say that SNMPv2 has lost the simplici
ty,
but the truth is that the changes were necessary, and could not have been avoide
d.
A management station relies on the agent at a device to retrieve or update
the
information at the device. The information is viewed as a logical database, call
ed a
Management Information Base, or MIB. MIB modules describe MIB variables for a
large variety of device types, computer hardware, and software components. The
original MIB for Managing a TCP/IP internet (now called MIB-I) was defined in RF
C
1066 in August of 1988. It was updated in RFC 1156 in May of 1990. The MIB-II
version published in RFC 1213 in May of 1991, contained some improvements, and
has proved that it can do a good job of meeting basic TCP/IP management needs.
MIB-II added many useful variables missing from MIB-I (Feit, 85). MIB files are
common variables used not only by SNMP, but CMIP as well.
In the late 1980's a project began, funded by governments, and large corpor
ations.
Common Management Information Protocol (CMIP) was born. Many thought that
because of it's nearly infinite development budget, that it would quickly become
in
widespread use, and overthrow SNMP from it's throne. Unfortunately, problems wi
th
its implementation have delayed its use, and it is now only available in limited
form
from developers themselves. (SNMP, Part 2 of 2, III.40.)
CMIP was designed to be better than SNMP in every way by repairing all flaw
s,
and expanding on what was good about it, making it a bigger and more detailed
network manager. It's design is similar to SNMP, where PDU's are used as variab
les
to monitor the network. CMIP however contains 11 types of PDU's (compared to
SNMP's 5). In CMIP, the variables are seen as very complex and sophisticated da
ta
structures with three attributes. These include:
1) Variable attributes: which represent the variables characteristics (its data
type, whether it is writable)
2) variable behaviors: what actions of that variable can be triggered.
3) Notifications: the variable generates an event report whenever a specified
event occurs (eg. A terminal shutdown would cause a variable notification
event) (Comer, 82)
As a comparison, SNMP only employs variable properties from one and three above.
The biggest feature of the CMIP protocol is that its variables not only relay in
formation
to and from the terminal (as in SNMP) , but they can also be used to perform tas
ks that
would be impossible under SNMP. For instance, if a terminal on a network cannot
reach the fileserver a pre-determined amount of times, then CMIP can notify
appropriate personnel of the event. With SNMP however, a user would have to
specifically tell it to keep track of unsuccessful attempts to reach the server,
and then
what to do when that variable reaches a limit. CMIP therefore results in a more
efficient management system, and less work is required from the user to keep upd
ated
on the status of the network. CMIP also contains the security measures left out
by
SNMP. Because of the large development budget, when it becomes available, CMIP
will be widely used by the government, and the corporations that funded it.
After reading the above paragraph, you might wonder why, if CMIP is this
wonderful, is it not being used already? (after all, it had been in development
for nearly
10 years) The answer is that possibly CMIP's only major disadvantage, is enough
in
my opinion to render it useless. CMIP requires about ten times the system resou
rces
that are needed for SNMP. In other words, very few systems in the world would a
ble
to handle a full implementation on CMIP without undergoing massive network
modifications. This disadvantage has no inexpensive fix to it. For that reason
, many
believe CMIP is doomed to fail. The other flaw in CMIP is that it is very diffi
cult to
program. Its complex nature requires so many different variables that only a fe
w
skilled programmers are able to use it to it's full potential.
Considering the above information, one can see that both management systems
have
their advantages and disadvantages. However the deciding factor between the two
,
lies with their implementation, for now, it is almost impossible to find a syste
m with
the necessary resources to support the CMIP model, even though it is superior to
SNMP (v1 and v2) in both design and operation. Many people believe that the
growing power of modern systems will soon fit well with CMIP model, and might
result in it's widespread use, but I believe by the time that day comes, SNMP co
uld
very well have adapted itself to become what CMIP currently offers, and more. A
s
we've seen with other products, once a technology achieves critical mass, and a
substantial installed base, it's quite difficult to convince users to rip it out
and start
fresh with an new and unproven technology (Borsook, 48). It is then recommend t
hat
SNMP be used in a situation where minimial security is needed, and SNMPv2 be use
d
where security is a high priority.

Works Cited
Borsook, Paulina. "SNMP tools evolving to meet critical LAN needs." Infoworld
June 1, 1992: 48-49.
Comer, Douglas E. Internetworking with TCP/IP New York: Prentice-Hall,
Inc., 1991.
Dryden, Partick. "Another view for SNMP." Computerworld December 11, 1995: 12.
Feit, Dr. Sidnie. SNMP. New York: McGraw-Hill Inc., 1995.
Fisher, Sharon. "Dueling Protocols." Byte March 1991: 183-190.
Horwitt, Elisabeth. "SNMP holds steady as network standard." Computerworld
June 1, 1992: 53-54.
Leon, Mark. "Advent creates Java tools for SNMP apps." Infoworld
March 25, 1996: 8.
Marshall, Rose. The Simple Book. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1994.
Miller, Mark A., P.E. Managing Internetworks with SNMP New York: M&T
Books, 1993.
Moore, Steve. "Committee takes another look at SNMP." Computerworld
January 16, 1995: 58.
Moore, Steve. "Users weigh benefits of DMI, SNMP." Computerworld
July, 31 1995: 60.
The SNMP Workshop & Panther Digital Corporation. SNMP FAQ Part 1 of 2.
Danbury, CT: http://www.www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/usenet/snmp-
faq/part1/faq.html, [email protected].
The SNMP Workshop & Panther Digital Corporation. SNMP FAQ Part 2 of 2.
Danbury, CT: http://www.www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/usenet/snmp-
faq/part2/faq.html, [email protected].
Stallings, William. SNMP, SNMPv2, and CMIP. Don Mills, Addison-Wesley, 1993.
Vallillee, Tyler, web page author. Http://www.undergrad.math.
uwaterloo.ca/~tkvallil/snmp.html
VanderSluis, Kurt. "SNMP: Not so simple." MacUser October 1992: 237-240
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