1.1.1 Why Use Java Dynamic Management Technology?

In the past, network management was usually performed by large, centralized management applications. These management applications monitored and modified their network by tightly controlling their agents. In addition, agents were usually situated in or near the network elements they controlled, which meant that these agents were limited in nature. The agents usually contained little management intelligence and could perform only basic network management operations.

A Java dynamic management agent exposes its resources in a standard way and provides management services directly at the resource level. These services provide the intelligence that enables agent applications to perform management tasks autonomously. This frees the management application from routine tasks such as polling and thus reduces the network load as well.

When you implement Java dynamic management technology, the interface to resources is standardized, meaning your management applications can use any technology you want. As long as management applications communicate through a Java dynamic management agent, they can access any resource.

The same flexibility applies to the management services that are deployed in the agents. Because the management services can control resources through standard interfaces, they are dynamically interchangeable. When new services become available, these services can be downloaded and be plugged in dynamically to upgrade the capabilities of a smart agent. Finally, the Java DMK provides a distributed model that is protocol independent. Management applications rely on the API, not on any one protocol.

The Java DMK brings new solutions to the management domain through the following advantages.

• Compliance with the JMX specification and the JMX Remote API specification, for managing Java objects through Java applications, as developed through the Java Community Process^SM(JCP^SM).

• A single suite of components that provides uniform instrumentation for managing systems, applications, and networks, and that provides universal access to these resources.

• A flexible architecture that distributes the management load. This architecture can also be upgraded in real time for the service-driven network.

The service-driven network is a new approach to network computing that concentrates on the services you want to provide. These range from the low-level services that manage relationships between network devices to the value-added services you provide to end users. These services drive your network and management needs. In addition, autonomous agent functionality makes it possible to manage a very large installed base.

With the Java dynamic management architecture, services can be incorporated directly into agents. Agents are given the intelligence to perform management tasks themselves, enabling management logic to be distributed throughout the whole network. New services can be downloaded from a web server at runtime using a dynamic pull mechanism. Services are not only implemented inside devices, but they can also be network-based. If your services are network-based, you can download them through simple web pages in the same way as Java technology-based applets.

You can connect to your agents remotely, using the connector protocols that were standardized in JMX Remote API. Using the remote method invocation (RMI) and JMX messaging protocol (JMXMP) connectors, you can access agents across a network with the connectors remaining completely invisible to either end of the connection. These connections can be secured using the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) security mechanism with the RMI connectors, and with the more advanced Simple Authentication and Security Layer (SASL) protocol with the JMXMP connector.

This dynamic, on-demand paradigm means that it is no longer necessary to know what will need to be configured, managed, and monitored in the future or in advance of network deployment. Services are created, enhanced and deployed as needed. This unique combination of features gives the Java DMK a wide domain of application as it integrates the current and future management standards.