Patent ID: 7809806

Claim:
A system, comprising: a local area network management system managing and configuring a network of routers; a wide area network management system managing and configuring a network of switches, the wide area network management system separate from the local area network management system; and address registration information appended to a message sent between a router of the network of routers and a switch of the network of switches over a connection between the router and the switch, wherein the local area network management system uses the address registration information in mapping the network of switches by accessing each switch in the network of switches, wherein the mapping by the local area network management system of the network of switches comprises: acquiring the address registration information from the router when the message is received at the router from the switch; accessing a management information base (MIB) associated with the switch using the address registration information; accessing other MIBs, each of the other MIBs associated with one of other switches of the network of switches, using the MIB associated with the switch from which the message is sent; and building a map of entire switches of the network of switches based upon accessing each of the other switches; wherein the local area network management system configures the network of switches when the map of entire switches of the network of switches is built from the local area network management system.