6.2 SNMP Communication With the DMI

The communication path between an SNMP management application and the DMI consists of the SNMP Master Agent and the DMI mapper snmpXdmid, as described in the following sections.

6.2.1 SNMP Master Agent

The SNMP Master Agent handles SNMP requests and responses between management applications and registered subagents in your system. The snmpd executable file installed with Solstice Enterprise Agents replaces any snmpd file that may already be installed in your system.

The SNMP Master Agent communicates with subagents in the system through SNMP PDUs. A process acting as a subagent may register a MIB subtree with the SNMP agent. Any request received by the Master Agent for a registered variable is passed through snmpdXdmid to the subagent, then performs the request and returns a response to the Master Agent.

6.2.2 DMI Mapper

The DMI mapper handles requests from and responses to the SNMP Master Agent in the system. When it receives a request, such as an SNMP Get request for a specific MIB variable, the mapper translates the MIB variable into a corresponding DMI MIF attribute. Indications sent by DMI components in the system are then converted to SNMP traps and sent to the management application. Translation of MIB variables into MIF attributes and indications into traps are performed only for those components that the mapper has registered with the SNMP Master Agent.