Patent ID: 6219703
Filing Date: 2001-04-17
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
A method in a data communication network having a network management station (NMS) for constructing in the NMS a device Management Information Base (MIB) for interfacing with a device, comprising the steps of:providing in the device an agent that includes a self-describing management structure MIB comprising data describing a device MIB structure supported by the device;programming the NMS with an application that can interpret the data of the self-describing management structure MIB in order to construct the device MIB;detecting by the NMS that the device is present on the network;accessing the self-describing management structure MIB of the device by the NMS to obtain, through conventional Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) commands, the data describing the device MIB structure, in response to the detecting step when the device MIB is not known to the NMS; andinterpreting by the application the data describing the device MIB structure, thereby constructing the device MIB in the NMS.