Patent ID: 8156215

Claim:
A management device comprising: an interface device to connect to and to interface with a first transport medium; a computer processor coupled to the interface device; a non-transitory computer readable memory accessible by the computer processor, wherein the non-transitory computer readable memory contains computer instructions executable by the computer processor to: maintain knowledge of a plurality of devices connected to the first transport medium; maintain knowledge of a defined device management protocol supported by a device management client; for each of the plurality of devices on the first transport medium for which a corresponding device management protocol is not known to the management device, determine the corresponding device management protocol by: sending command inquiries to the plurality of devices on the first transport medium according to a plurality of device management protocols in an iterative process; and for each of the plurality of devices that responds to a command inquiry in a particular device management protocol, associating the responding device with that device management protocol; convert a command inquiry received from a device management client to the corresponding device management protocol associated with a target device; convert device management data received from the target device to a format according to the defined device management protocol; and return the device management data to the device management client.