Foreword

This book provides a good introduction to and overview of the challenges involved in managing large enterprise networks and in developing effective software solutions for managing such networks. It focuses on the use of SNMP and MIBs in developing such solutions and uses the example of managing MPLS to illustrate the ideas presented.

Managing large networks is a difficult and expensive endeavor due to the wide variety of deployed technologies and products. While there are many tools available to help ease the burden of network management, there is still a huge amount of work to be done in improving these tools. In addition, new tools must constantly be developed to manage new technologies and products as they are introduced into networks.

Network administrators must be able to effectively evaluate and select tools and solutions to aid in managing their networks. As new technologies and products are introduced into their networks, administrators must understand how they are to be managed so that they can communicate the requirements for managing these new technologies and products to developers. To accomplish all this effectively, they must have a broad understanding of both the technologies and products being managed and of how management tools are designed and built.

Similarly, developers must have a good understanding of the challenges facing network administrators in managing their networks and how these challenges drive up the cost of network management. This understanding is vital to the development of better, more cost-effective tools.

Network Management, MIBs, and MPLS: Principles, Design, and Implementation begins with an overview of many of the technologies in common use in networks today and then discusses what it means to manage a network. It also gives an overview of SNMP and MIBs. SNMP is currently the most widely used protocol for network management. Having a general understanding of SNMP and MIBs is very useful in understanding network management in general. The book provides enough information about SNMP to give the reader a basic understanding of the protocol. It then discusses some of the challenges involved in network management along with some guidelines and strategies for dealing with these challenges.

The book offers a detailed discussion of how network management tools are designed, using examples of commercial and homegrown tools and the specific example of how the MPLS MIBs are used to manage MPLS. It concludes with some comments about current directions in the field of network management.

In order to address the challenges of network management, it is important for network administrators and developers of the tools they use to cooperate closely. In order to accomplish this, both must have a common understanding of the difficulties faced by each other. This book should help develop this common understanding and cooperation, and will provide the reader with a good overall understanding of the field of network management.

David  Levi
Senior  Staff  Software  Engineer,  Nortel  Networks
February  2003