Defining Desktop Management Standards

Although the Internet's SNMP has played a major role in network management standardization in the last five years (and thus has gained preeminence in network device management), it has limitations. SNMP does not address the configuration and systems management requirements of end nodes (servers and workstations). So, proposals for distributed desktop standards, such as the Desktop Mana gement Interface (DMI), have arisen in the last few years. Among the products evaluated for this roundup, only Microsoft SMS and the Intel LANDesk Management Suite support DMI-enabled products.

Defined by the Desktop Management Task Force, a 300-company consortium, DMI is an o pen architecture framework designed for managing computers, servers, peripherals, and software products. When it is complete, DMI will contain rules for creating management interface files (MIFs). These files specify, in ASCII text with defined grammar and syntax, attributes for classes of products.

The openness of DMI's architecture allows it to coexist with standards such as Plug and Play and SNMP. DMI complements Plug and Play by drawing configuration information from it into the standard MIF database. DMI works with SNMP by allowing MIFs to be mapped to SNMP management information base (MIB) files (see below).

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MIB.NGC

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In the Desktop Ma nagement Interface standard, each network component has a management interface file (MIF) that identifies it. MIFs can be mapped to, and closely resemble, SNMP management information base (MIB) files. That's a sample MIB file right above.