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SNMP in NI-4000 Controller

[Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 0
in AMX Hardware
Hi, im new to AMX and SNMP and would like some info regarding the SNMP capabilities of the NI-4000. Am I right in thinking that it comes as standard with SNMP? if so, how do I configure it?

Also throught the AMX controller I need to extract information from some devices that are non-snmp enabled, and thus I will need to create a proxy on the AMX controller so I can get this information from the devices. Is this possible using the programming API provided (Netlinx/java)? Or is there a better method to go about this.

Sorry if these questions are vague im just getting an understanding of the task I have to do.

:)

thanks

Comments

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    yuriyuri Posts: 861
    extract information from some devices? like? please be a bit more 'unvague' ;)
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    pauldpauld Posts: 106
    SNMP? As far as I know no AMX master has SNMP, the NI-4000 Included.
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    yuriyuri Posts: 861
    i remember reading it somewhere, i think in the document thats included with every master, ill look it up

    edit:
    ah, now i remember :)
    http://www.amx.com/techsupport/techNote.asp?id=473

    edit2:
    damnit, pauld just got ahead of me ;)
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    pauldpauld Posts: 106
    Ok, I just found this, Tech Note 473 goes over SNMP with AMX products.

    Paul
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    DHawthorneDHawthorne Posts: 4,584
    SNMP is just another TCP protocol, and AMX supports it the same way they support SMTP and HTML ... you write your own code to parse it and format your commands.

    It's analagous to asking if your word processor supports Italian - well, sure it does, but you need to know the language yourself first.
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    vincenvincen Posts: 526
    DHawthorne wrote:
    SNMP is just another TCP protocol, and AMX supports it the same way they support SMTP and HTML ... you write your own code to parse it and format your commands.

    It's just that SNMP is a pretty complex protocol to implement :( I looked at it one year ago and I dropped as it looked to be really complex to implement !!

    Vinc
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    Charles LawCharles Law Posts: 72
    In order to use SNMP, AMX has to supply MIBs so that you can use software like HP Overview to monitor AMX Controller. Generally, you don't need to know how the protocol is actually working.

    Charles
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    vincenvincen Posts: 526
    Charles Law wrote:
    In order to use SNMP, AMX has to supply MIBs so that you can use software like HP Overview to monitor AMX Controller. Generally, you don't need to know how the protocol is actually working.

    I think you misunderstood goal wanted here that is to do some SNMP requests on some remote devices and not making AMX product SNMP compliant ! Right ?

    Vinc
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    yuriyuri Posts: 861
    then why would you want the software respond to SNMP requests?
    Its easier to do this sort of task by using master-to-master, or just some regular TCP/IP connection...

    i think using SNMP on a netlinx master goes beyond the scope of SNMP
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    Charles LawCharles Law Posts: 72
    yuri wrote:
    then why would you want the software respond to SNMP requests?
    Its easier to do this sort of task by using master-to-master, or just some regular TCP/IP connection...

    i think using SNMP on a netlinx master goes beyond the scope of SNMP

    The basic purpose for AMX to support SNMP Standard is because, I think, AMX controllers which hook up to the computer network can be monitor by IT Department. As a network device like all other network devices that allow IT Department to monitor AMX controller status through its Network Management System(NMS) like HP Openview, a common and standardise monitoring platform that IT knows well.

    We need MIB that usually supplied by manufacturer of the device as protocol to link up the communication between AMX controller and Network Management System. Some other network device which allows NMS to both monitor and configurate the device
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    yuriyuri Posts: 861
    Charles Law wrote:
    The basic purpose for AMX to support SNMP Standard is because, I think, AMX controllers which hook up to the computer network can be monitor by IT Department. As a network device like all other network devices that allow IT Department to monitor AMX controller status through its Network Management System(NMS) like HP Openview, a common and standardise monitoring platform that IT knows well.

    We need MIB that usually supplied by manufacturer of the device as protocol to link up the communication between AMX controller and Network Management System. Some other network device which allows NMS to both monitor and configurate the device

    i get that point, but what do you expect to monitor? Network traffic? I dont think an IT department cares if the Netlinx controller is offline/online and more of that... Maybe im wrong :)
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    vincenvincen Posts: 526
    yuri wrote:
    i get that point, but what do you expect to monitor? Network traffic? I dont think an IT department cares if the Netlinx controller is offline/online and more of that... Maybe im wrong :)

    Well it could be nice to know if some devices are going online/offline, monitor some values of variables for example ;)

    Vinc
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    yuriyuri Posts: 861
    vincen wrote:
    Well it could be nice to know if some devices are going online/offline, monitor some values of variables for example ;)

    Vinc?n

    would the IT department care? ;)
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    ericmedleyericmedley Posts: 4,177
    yuri wrote:
    i get that point, but what do you expect to monitor? Network traffic? I dont think an IT department cares if the Netlinx controller is offline/online and more of that... Maybe im wrong :)

    Having worked in a very large managed network, I can assure you that NetLinx boxes give the Network/IT guys the creeps. They are very chatty compaired to most other network devices. I had a weekly discussion with those guys explaining that everything is indeed okay. The Netlinx box was not propogating viruses or whatnot.

    I had some experience with trying to use SNMP the other way around. I wanted to be able to get info from and modify a network router from the NetLinx master. (make the Netlinx master a SNMP manager)

    Once again, the main problem with SNMP in general is the MIB's. For most applications the memory needed to properly manage the protocol is prohibitive in the AMX world. You'd burn up a lot of RAM for something that you'd only occasionaly use. (speaking in compute clock time, of course)

    It'd be nice if SNMP would just die and we could all get on to something a little less 1980's in design. Probably not going to happen soon...
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    joelwjoelw Posts: 175
    SNMP is very appealing for large corporations to manage their assets from a central point. I have been in a number of discussions on this very subject.

    One technology that has renewed SNMP, is Cobranet. So if you want to control a generic Cobranet box SNMP is one way to do it. In some products, the only way.

    Contrary to it's name Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is far from simple under the hood. The concept is simple and not much more. The other issue is what version the device expects to communicate with: version 1, 2, or 3. Version 1 is much easier to implement than version 3.

    Some product cannot be upgraded with SNMP compliancy due to hardware design. SNMP has to thought about in conjunction with the hardware requirements.

    Yes one can hack a implementation to walk and control a products MIB, but don't expect to do much else without some serious software development.
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    maxifoxmaxifox Posts: 209
    ericmedley wrote:
    Having worked in a very large managed network, I can assure you that NetLinx boxes give the Network/IT guys the creeps. They are very chatty compaired to most other network devices. I had a weekly discussion with those guys explaining that everything is indeed okay.

    How about to use a VLAN for AMX network? Should help with those IP guys...
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    ericmedleyericmedley Posts: 4,177
    maxifox wrote:
    How about to use a VLAN for AMX network? Should help with those IP guys...

    First and foremost, I no longer work there. So, it's no longer my problem. But, A VLAN was suggested. We would have liked that anyway. It was a large University and we'd have liked having our own subnet instead of it being all over campus.

    Their issues had more to do with just the chatty nature of the NetLinx masters. Their monitoring software looked for overly chatty devices as a means to finding virus propigating computers.

    Our solution was to make sure that all the master's network names had 'Netlinx' in them and they set their rig up to ignore the name.

    I always felt they were just picking on us. I could show them statistics about how our or other Windows or Mac OSX servers on campus were practically screaming on the network. That didn't seem to bother them much. They fear what they don't know. : )

    thanks!
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