Appendix A: Changing Standards In The Server Management Environment; Web-Based Enterprise Management - Compaq BL10e - HP ProLiant - 512 MB RAM Troubleshooting Manual

Appendix A: Changing standards in the server
management environment
The system management world is moving to standards other than Simple Network Management
Protocol (SNMP) because SNMP-based management solutions have received increased scrutiny for
their simple structure and weak security protocol relative to current alternatives. SNMP is a
management standard in widespread use for a variety of management needs. It is a lightweight,
mature, and non-proprietary standard. However, there are limitations to SNMP server management:
• No guaranteed delivery: The UDP transport mechanism used with SNMP does not provide
guaranteed delivery of alerts, events, or queries
• Limited security: The most commonly used versions of SNMP, SNMP v1 and v2; do not provide
security features such as message authentication and encryption. SNMP does not use Secure Socket
Layer (SSL)
• Requires customization: The management information base (MIB) data structures use discrete islands
of information that are adequate for representing devices but not other components such as
applications, services, or their associations
• No automation: Managing servers with SNMP-based agent configurations can be a labor-intensive
process
Management tools are being deployed today in much greater volumes to improve system availability
and IT operational efficiency in data centers and remote server locations. As server technologies have
multiplied in the areas of auditing, security, remote access, automation, individual server
management, and management of multiple systems, the need to converge on a consistent solution has
emerged. Customers have many needs:
• Standardized ways of representing and transmitting management data independent of the server
hardware, management console, or the state of the server.
• More reliable, routable, and secure protocols for communicating between management consoles
and the managed devices. Administrators need to be able to manage servers regardless of their
physical location. Administrators also need to ensure that their ability to access servers remotely
does not increase server vulnerability to viruses or other problems.
• Management applications that are easily configured, thus reducing initial configuration times and
the number of mistakes.
VMware ESXi for ProLiant uses the emerging standard and industry trend of provider-based, Common
Information Model (CIM) management standards and infrastructure. WBEM uses the CIM standard to
represent systems, networks, applications, devices, and other managed components in an object-
oriented fashion. In addition, Systems Management Architecture for Server Hardware (SMASH) and
Storage Management Initiative Specification (SMI-S), secure and robust standards being driven by the
Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF) and Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA)
organizations, are quickly gaining momentum. The HP Insight Management WBEM Providers (Insight
Providers) are based on the SMASH and SMI-S standards, and further extend them to support
information that is specific to ProLiant platforms.

Web-based Enterprise Management

WBEM is a set of management and Internet standard technologies that have been brought together
by the DMTF to unify the management of enterprise computing environments.
standards includes a data model (CIM) and a management protocol. The original WBEM protocol,
CIM-XML, is in widespread use on Linux and UNIX systems and is the foundation for the SMI-S.
2 DMTF WBEM Definition, 2005, www.dmtf.org/standards/wbem
The core set of WBEM
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