Patent ID: 7716355

Claim:
A method of managing information in a storage space, the method comprising the machine-implemented steps of: receiving, at a Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) agent, a request for a plurality of object instances stored in the storage space, the request specifying a non-repeaters counter, a maximum repetitions counter, and one or more pairs of Object Identifier (OID) values, each pair including a starting OID value and an ending OID value, a particular condition of one or more conditions being based on a particular pair that includes a particular starting OID value and a particular ending OID value, the maximum repetitions counter indicating a number of requested values that are to be retrieved, subject to the one or more conditions, for each of a set of object instances that are specified by the request, the non-repeaters counter indicating a number of object instances specified by the request for which a single value is to be retrieved, the non-repeaters counter and the maximum repetitions counter being the only parameters specified in the request that are not OID values; retrieving the values of one or more object instances of the plurality of object instances; determining, during the step of retrieving the values of the one or more object instances, whether the maximum repetitions counter is reached and evaluating the particular condition based on the particular pair that includes the particular starting OID value and the particular ending OID value; and terminating the step of retrieving when the one or more conditions are satisfied even though the maximum repetitions counter is not reached; wherein the steps of the method are performed by one or more computer systems.