Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) Context EngineID Discovery
RFC 5343
Document | Type |
RFC - Internet Standard
(September 2008; No errata)
Updates RFC 3411
Status changed by status-change-5343-5590-5591-6353-to-internet-standard
Also known as STD 78
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Author | Jürgen Schönwälder | ||
Last updated | 2018-12-20 | ||
Stream | IETF | ||
Formats | plain text html pdf htmlized bibtex | ||
Stream | WG state | (None) | |
Document shepherd | No shepherd assigned | ||
This information refers to IESG processing after the RFC was initially published: | |||
IESG | IESG state | RFC 5343 (Internet Standard) | |
Consensus Boilerplate | Unknown | ||
Telechat date | |||
Responsible AD | Dan Romascanu | ||
Send notices to | (None) |
Network Working Group J. Schoenwaelder Request for Comments: 5343 Jacobs University Bremen Updates: 3411 September 2008 Category: Standards Track Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) Context EngineID Discovery Status of This Memo This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the Internet community, and requests discussion and suggestions for improvements. Please refer to the current edition of the "Internet Official Protocol Standards" (STD 1) for the standardization state and status of this protocol. Distribution of this memo is unlimited. Abstract The Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) version three (SNMPv3) requires that an application know the identifier (snmpEngineID) of the remote SNMP protocol engine in order to retrieve or manipulate objects maintained on the remote SNMP entity. This document introduces a well-known localEngineID and a discovery mechanism that can be used to learn the snmpEngineID of a remote SNMP protocol engine. The proposed mechanism is independent of the features provided by SNMP security models and may also be used by other protocol interfaces providing access to managed objects. This document updates RFC 3411. Table of Contents 1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 2. Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 3. Procedure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 3.1. Local EngineID . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 3.2. EngineID Discovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 4. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 5. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 6. Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 7. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 7.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 7.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Schoenwaelder Standards Track [Page 1] RFC 5343 SNMP Context EngineID Discovery September 2008 1. Introduction To retrieve or manipulate management information using the third version of the Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMPv3) [RFC3410], it is necessary to know the identifier of the remote SNMP protocol engine, the so-called snmpEngineID [RFC3411]. While an appropriate snmpEngineID can in principle be configured on each management application for each SNMP agent, it is often desirable to discover the snmpEngineID automatically. This document introduces a discovery mechanism that can be used to learn the snmpEngineID of a remote SNMP protocol engine. The proposed mechanism is independent of the features provided by SNMP security models. The mechanism has been designed to coexist with discovery mechanisms that may exist in SNMP security models, such as the authoritative engine identifier discovery of the User-based Security Model (USM) of SNMP [RFC3414]. This document updates RFC 3411 [RFC3411] by clarifying the IANA rules for the maintenance of the SnmpEngineID format registry. The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119 [RFC2119]. 2. Background Within an administrative domain, an SNMP engine is uniquely identified by an snmpEngineID value [RFC3411]. An SNMP entity, which consists of an SNMP engine and several SNMP applications, may provide access to multiple contexts. An SNMP context is a collection of management information accessible by an SNMP entity. An item of management information may exist in more than one context and an SNMP entity potentially has access to many contexts [RFC3411]. A context is identified by the snmpEngineID value of the entity hosting the management information (also called a contextEngineID) and a context name that identifies the specific context (also called a contextName). To identify an individual item of management information within an administrative domain, a four tuple is used consisting of 1. a contextEngineID, 2. a contextName, Schoenwaelder Standards Track [Page 2] RFC 5343 SNMP Context EngineID Discovery September 2008 3. an object type, and 4. its instance identification. The last two elements are encoded in an object identifier (OID) value. The contextName is a character string (following the SnmpAdminString textual convention of the SNMP-FRAMEWORK-MIB [RFC3411]) while the contextEngineID is an octet string constructedShow full document text