SNMP-manageable private MIB

[Laurence Crutcher <[e-mail]>]

I want to design a private MIB and manage it via SNMP (for the purpose
of this discussion, I do not distinguish between V1 and V2). The Managed 
Objects reside on a workstation.

In order to minimize the work that I need to do, and to allow my MIB 
to be managed through exisiting management packages such as SunNet Manager
or HP OpenView, I'm looking at how I can get to a private MIB through
the SNMP agent provided with these systems. I would like my software to 
interface to any SNMP-compliant manager, without having to re-write a lot
of the agent/MO software.

So far, I've only looked at SunNet manager in detail, and spoken to 
technical support at Sun, and I can see no way of interfacing new MOs
to their SNMP agent. The published interface to the manager restricts 
the programmer to using a direct rpc interface to the manager.

Am I missing something here?

An alternative approach I've considered is to implement my own SNMP agent,
interface this to the MOs in my own MIB, and then have this agent sit 
side-by-side with other SNMP agents (such as that from SunNet Manager, should
it be running on the same workstation at the same time). However, given
the reliance on well-known ports for SNMP communication, this raises the 
question of how the manager should differentiate between SNMP agents.

I don't know if this is possible or even allowed. Again, can anybody
enlighten me on this?

The problem at hand seems to me to be one that others must have faced already,
so I'm surprised at the lack of support for this with SunNet Manager.

Any suggestions or advice would be welcome.

Thanks

Laurence

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Laurence Crutcher                     phone: [phone]
Market Vision Corp.                   e-mail: [e-mail]
40 Rector Street
New York
N.Y 10006
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