PMP Mail Archive: RE: PMP> Comments on Printer Port Monitor

RE: PMP> Comments on Printer Port Monitor MIB 1.0 working draft dated March 21, 2005

From: Bergman, Ron (Ron.Bergman@rpsa.ricoh.com)
Date: Tue Mar 22 2005 - 14:05:22 EST

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    Hi Chuck,

    Glad to see you are still monitoring our activity!

    See my responses in-line.

            Ron

    -----Original Message-----
    From: pmp-owner@pwg.org [mailto:pmp-owner@pwg.org]On Behalf Of Adams,
    Charles A
    Sent: Tuesday, March 22, 2005 8:46 AM
    To: 'pmp@pwg.org'
    Subject: PMP> Comments on Printer Port Monitor MIB 1.0 working draft
    dated March 21, 2005

    1. ppmGeneralNaturalLanguage

    Why does this MIB define the following object?

    It seems like localization information will reside in multiple places,
    prtGeneralCurrentLocalization/prtLocalizationTable and also
    ppmGeneralNaturalLanguage.

    Is it because this MIB needs to be independent of the printer MIB? Is it
    expected this MIB may be implemented on a device that does not implement
    the printer MIB?

    <Ron> I'll let Ira handle this one.

    2. ppmPortHrDeviceIndex - This seems to imply an hrDeviceTable entry is
    needed for each port on the system. Is this the expected behavior?
    Or is this just the hrDeviceIndex of the printer?
    Or is the the hrDeviceIndex for the network card?

    <Ron> This is primarly for servers with many attached printers. For the
          network attached printer, this value should always be 1.

    3. ppmPortSnmpCommunityName - This MIB is going to expose the SNMP read
    community name? If the read community name is not already known by a
    client, how can this value be read in the first place?

    <Ron> Per Microsoft, some printers use a different community name as a
          method to differentiate services in SNMP. For most printers this
          value will be the known community name.

    4. Seems like returning this value over SNMPv1 is a security hole that
    should not be so
    glaring. This value should be defined to always return a “NULL” string
    unless the transfer is done using SNMP encryption and authentication.

    <Ron> Good point. If the community names are all read-only, the risk
          is minimal.

    5. Rather than defining ppmPortSnmpCommunityName it might be useful to
    specify
    ppmPortSnmpCommunityName as r/w. The MS applications that want to change the
    community
    name would then have a standard way to do this.

    <Ron> Yes, but this does increase the security risk.

    Chuck Adams
    West Coast Program Management Team/SEBU/XOG
    Phone (503) 685-2589 Internal 8-875-2589
    Charles.A.Adams@office.xerox.com



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