WBMM> Management Commands

WBMM> Management Commands

Harry Lewis harryl at us.ibm.com
Wed Jan 29 19:13:33 EST 2003


I think a new information model is exactly what is needed and I don't 
think CIM is the answer although CIM should be taken into consideration 
along with MIBs. Legacy (extant?) will be handled via proxy. I believe we 
need a new model because

1. Conflicting models exist today (MIBs, CIM, NPAP etc.)
2. The domain has expanded (MFPs, Services)

When I read a Charter that addresses remote management using web protocols 
and with the ability to traverse firewalls... immediately an SNMP 
replacement comes to mind. 
---------------------------------------------- 
Harry Lewis 
IBM Printing Systems 
---------------------------------------------- 




"Wagner,William" <WWagner at NetSilicon.com>
Sent by: owner-wbmm at pwg.org
01/29/2003 02:59 PM
 
        To:     "MARKLE,CATHY (HP-Boise,ex1)" <cathy_markle at hp.com>, Harry 
Lewis/Boulder/IBM at IBMUS
        cc:     <wbmm at pwg.org>
        Subject:        RE: WBMM> Management Commands


Cathy,
 
Certainly an interesting twist. Coming up with  a replacement for SNMP and 
MIBs is a task of major proportions. Of course, any document may be 
interpreted to mean something  far beyond was was intended by the writer. 
Although the charter draft does not exclude developing an SNMP 
replacement, the document does stress both by the  examples and the 
priorities  the idea of remote management. And two of the three initial 
examples are for extra-enterprise access. That is not to say that an SNMP 
replacement should not be considered, if the need can be established.
 
But if you see a need to replace SNMP, I do refer you to the DTMF site 
http://www.dmtf.org/standards/  which has developed WEBM (Web  Base 
Management) which expresses CIM, an alternate management information 
model, in XML. 
 
I think that if you want a replacement to SNMP and the MIBS (and I 
personally do not think that this is necessary), the DMTF work is the 
place to start. Indeed, I think that much of what they have done is 
applicable to WBMM.  What the DTMF work does not appear to have addressed 
is the communication of management information outside the firewall to 
supply, service and leasing companies that are not part of the enterprise. 
And the reason may well be that the driving need for remote management is 
a different application that usually is not interested in the details of 
local management but in a different class of interaction. The point was 
made that this level of interaction may also be local, and we should 
therefore consider manger-initiated contact as well as the service or 
device initiated contact that would characterize firewall addressing 
solutions.
 
The pressing need that needs to be addressed is concerned with 
communicating the information that already exists, whether it be in a MIB, 
a MIF, a web page or whatever. Although we may decide that we want to go 
on to define a new management information model, that that was not the 
intent of the charter. Indeed, we will have failed if we do not define a 
communication method that deal with data expressed in the extant 
management information models.
 
William A. Wagner (Bill Wagner) 
Director of Technology 
Imaging Division 
NETsilicon, Inc. 
781-398-4588 
-----Original Message-----
From: MARKLE,CATHY (HP-Boise,ex1) [mailto:cathy_markle at hp.com]
Sent: Wednesday, January 29, 2003 11:58 AM
To: 'Harry Lewis'; Wagner,William
Cc: wbmm at pwg.org
Subject: RE: WBMM> Management Commands

I agree with what Harry is saying.  I want to see us working on a 
replacement for SNMP and the MIB which I definitely see as being inside 
the scope of the charter.  Doing this will give us a solution that works 
inside the firewall as well as outside the firewall. 
 
Cathy Markle
-----Original Message-----
From: Harry Lewis [mailto:harryl at us.ibm.com]
Sent: Tuesday, January 28, 2003 10:20 PM
To: Wagner,William
Cc: wbmm at pwg.org
Subject: RE: WBMM> Management Commands


Nothing in the charter leads me to believe my perspective on remote 
management to the same granularity as currently available via SNMP is 
excluded or out of scope. I suggest we continue to strive for consensus 
and make appropriate modifications or clarifications to the charter before 
sending out for approval. 

I'd like to hear from some others. 
---------------------------------------------- 
Harry Lewis 
IBM Printing Systems 
---------------------------------------------- 



"Wagner,William" <WWagner at NetSilicon.com> 
Sent by: owner-wbmm at pwg.org 
01/28/2003 04:30 PM 
        
        To:        Harry Lewis/Boulder/IBM at IBMUS, <wbmm at pwg.org> 
        cc:         
        Subject:        RE: WBMM> Management Commands




Harry, 
  
Your  comments reflect a different perspective on the activity, or at 
least on the  priorities. It seems that you see the effort as a general 
replacement for SNMP,  perhaps defining some replacement to the MIBs. What 
I see as the most  pressing need is to provide for remote access to 
existing data bases, be they  MIBs or the data current accessed by web 
pages, or some internal parameters.   
  
I also  do not see this in terms of a management station canvassing to see 
what device  supports what. In general, I do not think that that sort of 
fishing would be  allowed in many enterprises. Rather, I see the device 
being registered  with the remote server to provide reposts according to 
some pre-arraigned  agreement on what parameters would be monitored. 
Indeed, the idea was to define  the transport and a general formal by 
which elements could be queried or  specified. Although items such as you 
mention (size of media in trays) would not  be excluded, it does not seem 
the sort of thing that would be of interest to a  remote server. I will 
post the list of things brainstormed at the  BOF. 
 
I  intended the proposed Charter to be clear that this activity  was to 
use the path intended for web browsing to allow authorized  but 
non-enterprise agencies to monitor (for usage information, for example) 
and perhaps do specific maintenance (for updates or upgrades, for example) 
to  on-enterprise site equipment. it was not the intent that this be a 
general  SNMP replacement.  Perhaps you may want to look at the charter 
again  before we send it out for final approval. ( I have attached the 
draft as  modified at Maui). By the way, the title is Charter Proposal for 
 PWG WEB-Based Monitoring and Management, hence  WBMM. 
  
Bill  Wagner 
 
  
-----Original Message----- 
From: Harry Lewis  [mailto:harryl at us.ibm.com] 
Sent: Monday, January 27, 2003 2:46  PM 
To: wbmm at pwg.org 
Subject: WBMM> Management  Commands 



SNMP has GET,  SET, GETBULK etc. What types of commands would we like to 
see in WBMM (what  does WBMM stand for, anyway!?... perhaps separate 
discussion... aren't we  forgetting the U word... "Universal Deice and 
Services Management") 

Back to the topic... 

I'm thinking we will want to improve on the interfaces  and commands based 
on what we have learned over the years implementing the  Printer MIB. 
Please share your thoughts. Here are some of mine. We  need... 

1. A way to query what  attributes are settable and which are not (we 
learned, with SNMP, that  "MaxAccess" isn't always that helpful). 
2. A way to query attribute (elements?) either singularly (tell me size of 
media in "main" tray), in bulk (give me the "input group"), or filtered 
(tell me the name of each tray; tell me all trays which are loaded with 
transparency). 
3. If we end up with  mandatory and optional commands or interfaces, a way 
to query which are  supported in a particular implementation (describe via 
WSIL/WSDL?). 

 ---------------------------------------------- 
Harry Lewis   
IBM Printing Systems 
----------------------------------------------   


#### Charter Proposal 2.doc has been removed from this note on January 28, 
2003 by Harry Lewis 
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