net-snmp-coders — Discussion of internal project coding (Please use this OR -users, NOT both!)

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Wes H. <wjh...@uc...>]

>>>>> On Thu, 23 Nov 2000 00:34:04 +0100, Juergen Schoenwaelder <sc...@ib...> said:

Juergen> (Although I would personally prefer to be able to just pass a
Juergen> string without being responsible to distinguish between " and
Juergen> ' and the MIB lookup would take care of the rest.)

Actually, I'd like to see (but haven't done it, though I thought Niels
had) that strings could be specified without quotes entirely if the
MIB structure was in place.  That makes the most sense.

Juergen> [Enough bits wasted on this - back to some more serious stuff.]

no kidding.
-- 
Wes Hardaker
Please mail all replies to net...@li...

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Juergen S. <sc...@ib...>]

>>>>> Wes Hardaker writes:

Wes> And, anyway, we're *not* coming up with a random number
Wes> assignment.  We're coming up with the translation that the user
Wes> asked for:

Wes>  ...foo ->   unknown object identifier
Wes>  ..."foo" -> ...3.102.111.111
Wes>  ...'foo' -> ...102.111.111

Wes> There is *no* guesswork on our part.  The user has given us a
Wes> very very clear indication of what he wants.

OK. I did not know at the beginning of this thread that the 'foo'
conversion exists in addition to the "foo" conversion. So in this
case, it is indeed the user's responsibility.

(Although I would personally prefer to be able to just pass a string
 without being responsible to distinguish between " and ' and the MIB
 lookup would take care of the rest.)

[Enough bits wasted on this - back to some more serious stuff.]

/js

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Wes H. <wjh...@uc...>]

>>>>> On Wed, 22 Nov 2000 15:22:29 -0800, "David T. Perkins" <dpe...@ds...> said:

David> It seems like the problem can be solved in two ways, which are:
David> 1) the user has to specify the length (if needed). For example,
David> if a length is needed, the user must specify .3."foo" instead
David> of just ."foo".
David> 2) a new symbol can be specified to indicate that a length
David> needs to prefix the OIDfied string. For example, for
David> a length to be inserted, how about the following: .+."foo".

3) what we're doing now:

   .'foo' = f.o.o
   ."foo" = 3.f.o.o

-- 
Wes Hardaker
Please mail all replies to net...@li...

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Wes H. <wjh...@uc...>]

>>>>> On Thu, 23 Nov 2000 00:02:49 +0100, Juergen Schoenwaelder <sc...@ib...> said:

Juergen> Wes, chown does not have this flaw. If you pass a number,
Juergen> then it is clear what it will do as the file system only
Juergen> cares about numbers. If you pass a user name, then it looks
Juergen> up the UID in a password database and calls chown(2) only if
Juergen> the lookup was successful. Thus, the chown behaviour is well
Juergen> defined.

Juergen> The analogy would be a chown which takes a string argument
Juergen> and if it does not find a match in the password database, it
Juergen> makes a best guess what the UID could be and calls
Juergen> chown(2). Such a chown program might be fun for a hacker but
Juergen> not for me.

The SNMP protocol doesn't care about the name, only the numeric
translation.

And, anyway, we're *not* coming up with a random number assignment.
We're coming up with the translation that the user asked for:

  ...foo ->   unknown object identifier
  ..."foo" -> ...3.102.111.111
  ...'foo' -> ...102.111.111

There is *no* guesswork on our part.  The user has given us a very
very clear indication of what he wants.
-- 
Wes Hardaker
Please mail all replies to net...@li...

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[David T. P. <dpe...@ds...>]

HI,

Adding support for ."foo" to replace .102.111.111 was a great addition.
It is true that without MIB knowledge, a program does not know
whether or not to prefix the OIDfied string with a prefix length.
It seems like the problem can be solved in two ways, which are:
1) the user has to specify the length (if needed). For example,
   if a length is needed, the user must specify .3."foo" instead
   of just ."foo".
2) a new symbol can be specified to indicate that a length
   needs to prefix the OIDfied string. For example, for
   a length to be inserted, how about the following: .+."foo".

Regards,
/david t. perkins

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Juergen S. <sc...@ib...>]

>>>>> Wes Hardaker writes:

Wes> Anyway, would you apply the same strictness to other tools like
Wes> chown (picking one at random), not allowing it to accept a number
Wes> and forcing the user to have the user name in the password file
Wes> for translation?

Wes, chown does not have this flaw. If you pass a number, then it is
clear what it will do as the file system only cares about numbers. If
you pass a user name, then it looks up the UID in a password database
and calls chown(2) only if the lookup was successful. Thus, the chown
behaviour is well defined.

The analogy would be a chown which takes a string argument and if it
does not find a match in the password database, it makes a best guess
what the UID could be and calls chown(2). Such a chown program might
be fun for a hacker but not for me.

/js

-- 
Juergen Schoenwaelder      Technical University Braunschweig
<sc...@ib...>  Dept. Operating Systems & Computer Networks
Phone: +49 531 391 3289    Bueltenweg 74/75, 38106 Braunschweig, Germany
Fax:   +49 531 391 5936    <URL:http://www.ibr.cs.tu-bs.de/~schoenw/>

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Wes H. <wjh...@uc...>]

>>>>> On Wed, 22 Nov 2000 23:28:34 +0100, Juergen Schoenwaelder <sc...@ib...> said:

Juergen> I strongly disagree. A program which simply converts

Juergen> SNMP-COMMUNITY-MIB::snmpCommunityName."foo" 

Juergen> to 1.3.6.1.6.3.18.1.1.1.2.3.102.111.111 is broken.

You're obviously not a hacker!

Juergen> A program which converts 1.3.6.1.6.3.18.1.1.1.2."foo" to
Juergen> either

Juergen> 1.3.6.1.6.3.18.1.1.1.2.3.102.111.111
Juergen> or
Juergen> 1.3.6.1.6.3.18.1.1.1.2.102.111.111

It would pick the first.  We reserve the other quote marks ('') for
the non-prefixed case.

I'm not saying its a good thing for general practice, but typing
\"foo\" is much easier than typing .102.111.111 since I don't have the
ascii table memorized.

Anyway, would you apply the same strictness to other tools like chown
(picking one at random), not allowing it to accept a number and
forcing the user to have the user name in the password file for
translation?

Anyway, my goal is always to provide the ultimate in flexibility.  99%
of the world won't need the functionality, but the rest of us might.
-- 
Wes Hardaker
Please mail all replies to net...@li...

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Juergen S. <sc...@ib...>]

>>>>> Wes Hardaker writes:

Juergen> So any code which does an automatic conversion based on a
Juergen> best guess is just flawed.

Wes> It's the users guess, not the codes.  It's entirely his fault.

I strongly disagree. A program which simply converts

	SNMP-COMMUNITY-MIB::snmpCommunityName."foo" 

to 1.3.6.1.6.3.18.1.1.1.2.3.102.111.111 is broken. A program which
converts 1.3.6.1.6.3.18.1.1.1.2."foo" to either

	1.3.6.1.6.3.18.1.1.1.2.3.102.111.111
or
	1.3.6.1.6.3.18.1.1.1.2.102.111.111

depending on whether the relevant MIB is loaded or not is IMHO also
broken. I think it is not the user's responsibility to take care of
"best guess" conversions done in an SNMP utility.

/js

-- 
Juergen Schoenwaelder      Technical University Braunschweig
<sc...@ib...>  Dept. Operating Systems & Computer Networks
Phone: +49 531 391 3289    Bueltenweg 74/75, 38106 Braunschweig, Germany
Fax:   +49 531 391 5936    <URL:http://www.ibr.cs.tu-bs.de/~schoenw/>

Re: rmon possibilities?

[<ni...@ba...>]

On Wed, 22 Nov 2000 09:24:38 -0500 (EST) Jas...@ms... wrote:
>	thanks for all the help so far, everyone...i had one more question
>for all of you...obviously, one can use an snmpset to set values once the
>system is already up.  my understanding is that when you do something like
>"proc netscape 4" inside your snmpd.conf, that creates the appropriate
>entries in the mib table...having said that, is there a way to add entries
>once the system is already up?  that is, if i want to monitor a new
>process, do i have to restart the thing, or is there a way to either force
>a re-reading of the config file, or to simply add mibs by
>manually...trying to simply run snmpset returns an error when you try to
>set to a mib that doesn't exist...

Changing the configuration of this through SNMP has not been implemented yet.
You will have to change the snmpd.conf file, and you may then make the agent
reload the configuration either by sending it a SIGHUP, or by doing a snmpset
of UCD-SNMP-MIB::versionUpdateConfig.0 to 1

/Niels

-- 
Get your firstname@lastname email for FREE at http://Nameplanet.com/?su

Re: Perl SNMP doc update questions

[Wes H. <wjh...@uc...>]

>>>>> On Wed, 22 Nov 2000 16:17:35 +0100 (MET), Simon Leinen <si...@li...> said:

Simon> So I agree with Joe that SNMP.pm should not be renamed Net::SNMP and
Simon> also that there's a likely source of confusion between NET-SNMP's Perl
Simon> bindings and Net::SNMP, but I don't know what to do about it
Simon> either.

I agree...  It's going to have to stay as is.

On another note, its good to hear from you Simon!
-- 
Wes Hardaker
Please mail all replies to net...@li...

Re: openssl-0.9.6

[Wes H. <wjh...@uc...>]

>>>>> On 21 Nov 2000 22:51:25 -0000, ni...@ba... (Niels Baggesen) said:

>> snmpwalk: USM authentication failure

Niels> This is probably an error that originates from the agent

It does.  The remote agent is telling you that your password is incorrect.

-- 
Wes Hardaker
Please mail all replies to net...@li...

Re: rmon possibilities?

[Wes H. <wjh...@uc...>]

>>>>> On Wed, 22 Nov 2000 09:24:38 -0500 (EST), Jas...@ms... said:

Jason> my understanding is that when you do something like "proc
Jason> netscape 4" inside your snmpd.conf, that creates the
Jason> appropriate entries in the mib table...having said that, is
Jason> there a way to add entries once the system is already up?  that
Jason> is, if i want to monitor a new process, do i have to restart
Jason> the thing, or is there a way to either force a re-reading of
Jason> the config file, or to simply add mibs by manually...trying to
Jason> simply run snmpset returns an error when you try to set to a
Jason> mib that doesn't exist...

You can't use snmpset (on that mib at least).  You can, however,
modify the .conf file and either send a SIGHUP signal to the agent or
perform an snmpset on:

nterprises.ucdavis.version.versionUpdateConfig
versionUpdateConfig OBJECT-TYPE
  -- FROM       UCD-SNMP-MIB
  SYNTAX        INTEGER
  MAX-ACCESS    read-write
  STATUS        current
  DESCRIPTION   "Set to 1 to read-read the config file(s)."
::= { iso(1) org(3) dod(6) internet(1) private(4) enterprises(1) ucdavis(2021) version(100) 11 }                                                                
-- 
Wes Hardaker
Please mail all replies to net...@li...

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Wes H. <wjh...@uc...>]

>>>>> On Wed, 22 Nov 2000 11:24:47 +0100, Juergen Schoenwaelder <sc...@ib...> said:

Juergen> This is _NOT_ possible. You need to know how a table is
Juergen> indexed to form the instance identifier. In particular, you
Juergen> need to know whether a string is fixed length or not. If it
Juergen> is variable length, then you need to know whether an implied
Juergen> bit applies.

I'm not saying it should be common practice, but if you sweep an
entire mib tree from remote box for which you don't have internal MIBs
for but you have figured out what certain sections do then referencing
by name would be difficult.

It would also be difficult if you only had the binary and not the mibs
on a certain system.

I'd still much rather be able to specify strings in an OID for the
above 2 cases.

Juergen> So any code which does an automatic conversion based on a
Juergen> best guess is just flawed.

It's the users guess, not the codes.  It's entirely his fault.

-- 
Wes Hardaker
Please mail all replies to net...@li...

Re: New port OS/2

[Sergey I. Y. <ev...@na...>]

On Wed, 22 Nov 2000 11:03:06 -0500, Michael J. Slifcak wrote:

Hi,

>Hi, Sergey.  The UCD-SNMP project has moved.  It is now
>the net-snmp project.

Thanks, it's fixed now.

>4.2 release is imminent -- might be better to wait several weeks
>and address your patches from that version.

Unfortunately I can't wait. 

>> First of all I'd like to have this port included with main distribution. How this can be done?
>
>Please provide a context diff patch between the original
>and modified source trees. For example (from Unix/Linux/Solaris):
>
>diff -wur net-snmp-4.2.pre2   net-snmp-os2 | grep -v '^Only' >
>os2patch.txt
>
>If you use or have any copyrighted source materials, please indicate
>those authors and license restrictions in the patch text. 

Thanks. I'll complete port and will send complete patch. At present only snmplib from 4.1.2 is
complete (some things I'd like to change but at present it at least compiles and should work)
and now I'm moving my changes to 4.2.pre2.


Regards,
	Sergey.

*--------------------------------------
ES@Home

Re: New port OS/2

[Michael J. S. <msl...@is...>]

Correction:

Current software version is
http://download.sourceforge.net/net-snmp/ucd-snmp-4.2.pre2.tar.gz

Re: New port OS/2

[Michael J. S. <msl...@is...>]

Hi, Sergey.  The UCD-SNMP project has moved.  It is now
the net-snmp project.

Discussion has moved to net...@li...

Please send all replies to net...@li...
[Including any patch for OS/2 that you might provide].

Please see the revised home page at http://net-snmp.sourceforge.net/

Current software version is
http://download.sourceforge.net/net-snmp/net-snmp-4.2.pre2.tar.gz 

4.2 release is imminent -- might be better to wait several weeks
and address your patches from that version.

Portions of Net-SNMP compile and run under Win32 API and under
Cygnus/Windows environments.  Any improvements you wish to suggest
are welcomed.

Best Regards,
-Mike Slifcak, Internet Security Systems, Inc.


"Sergey I. Yevtushenko" wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> I'm porting ucd-snmp to OS/2.
> During porting process some questions appeared and I'd like to know your opinions about it.
> 
> First of all I'd like to have this port included with main distribution. How this can be done?

Please provide a context diff patch between the original
and modified source trees. For example (from Unix/Linux/Solaris):

diff -wur net-snmp-4.2.pre2   net-snmp-os2 | grep -v '^Only' >
os2patch.txt

If you use or have any copyrighted source materials, please indicate
those authors and license restrictions in the patch text. 


> 
> Other issues are more technical:
> 
> 1. I have found that entire package completely ignores possible problems with function calling
> convention used by different compilers. Although this unlikely a problem in most unixes, this may cause
> serious problems when parts of package compiled by one compiler while other parts with other.
> This issue can be resolved by adding to all function prototypes, function pointer members in structures
> and typedefs some symbol which may be defined to nothing on unix platforms or to something specific
> on OS/2 and Win32 (it also may suffer from this problem).


Always open to recommendations.  With the patch you might provide,
a discussion can properly begin.


> 
> Something like this:
> 
> typedef int (*CALL_CONV snmp_callback) (int, struct snmp_session *, int, struct snmp_pdu *, void *);
> 
> void CALL_CONV snmpv3_authtype_conf(const char *word, char *cptr);

I think a compiled example from your patch would be appropriate to
discuss.

> 
> 2. Similar issue with alignment of structures. Although there is no standard way to accomplish this,
> I think that most current compilers recognizes and able to handle correctly #pragma pack()
> In either case compilers that don't recognize this pragma will just ignore it and nothing bad happens.
> If to use this approach then each header will have (snmpv3.h used as an example):
> 
> #ifndef SNMPV3_H
> #define SNMPV3_H
> 
> #pragma pack(1)
> 
> at the beginning and
> 
> #pragma pack()
> #endif /* SNMPV3_H */
> 
> at the end.
> 
> Comments and opinions are welcome.
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> Regards,
>         Sergey.
>

Re: Perl SNMP doc update questions

[Simon L. <si...@li...>]

>>>>> "wh" == Wes Hardaker <wjh...@uc...> writes:
>>>>> On Mon, 20 Nov 2000 10:12:41 -0500, "G. S. Marzot" <ma...@ti...> said:
G> last bit of administravia - there is a Net::SNMP perl module out on
G> CPAN currently and there is already some level of confusion between
G> our SNMP module and that one. I expect that level to rise some...I
G> guess this is just fair warning seeing as its too late to change
G> the name again.  Ideally our perl SNMP module would be named
G> Net::SNMP but I don't see that happening either.

> True...  I hadn't thought of that naming conflict.  I think the
> other one is still being developed/maintained at least minimally too
> (Simon's right?).

To add to the confusion...

Net::SNMP is not my code.  It is a much cleaner rewrite by David
M. Town of an older version of mine (which doesn't really have a name
itself... most people call it SNMP_Session.pm).  We haven't tried to
merge the two or even keep them similar, so functionality has diverged
between the two.

Both David's and my code are being maintained, i.e. there are new
versions.

I think there are good reasons for the existence of both SNMP.pm and
Net::SNMP (my own code should probably be merged into David's).  Some
applications will always prefer a standalone version that doesn't
require the net-snmp library (until all systems come with net-snmp
preinstalled :-), others need the enhanced features that
net-snmp/SNMP.pm provide, such as excellent MIB support, good BER
encoding/decoding performance, SNMPv3 etc.

So I agree with Joe that SNMP.pm should not be renamed Net::SNMP and
also that there's a likely source of confusion between NET-SNMP's Perl
bindings and Net::SNMP, but I don't know what to do about it either.
-- 
Simon.

New port

[Sergey I. Y. <ev...@na...>]

Hi,

I'm porting ucd-snmp to OS/2. 
During porting process some questions appeared and I'd like to know your opinions about it.

First of all I'd like to have this port included with main distribution. How this can be done?

Other issues are more technical:

1. I have found that entire package completely ignores possible problems with function calling 
convention used by different compilers. Although this unlikely a problem in most unixes, this may cause
serious problems when parts of package compiled by one compiler while other parts with other.
This issue can be resolved by adding to all function prototypes, function pointer members in structures
and typedefs some symbol which may be defined to nothing on unix platforms or to something specific 
on OS/2 and Win32 (it also may suffer from this problem). 

Something like this:

typedef int (*CALL_CONV snmp_callback) (int, struct snmp_session *, int, struct snmp_pdu *, void *);

void CALL_CONV snmpv3_authtype_conf(const char *word, char *cptr);

2. Similar issue with alignment of structures. Although there is no standard way to accomplish this,
I think that most current compilers recognizes and able to handle correctly #pragma pack()
In either case compilers that don't recognize this pragma will just ignore it and nothing bad happens.
If to use this approach then each header will have (snmpv3.h used as an example):

#ifndef SNMPV3_H
#define SNMPV3_H

#pragma pack(1)

at the beginning and 

#pragma pack()
#endif /* SNMPV3_H */

at the end.

Comments and opinions are welcome.

Thanks.

Regards,
	Sergey.

*--------------------------------------
ES@Home

Re: rmon possibilities?

[<Jas...@ms...>]

	thanks for all the help so far, everyone...i had one more question
for all of you...obviously, one can use an snmpset to set values once the
system is already up.  my understanding is that when you do something like
"proc netscape 4" inside your snmpd.conf, that creates the appropriate
entries in the mib table...having said that, is there a way to add entries
once the system is already up?  that is, if i want to monitor a new
process, do i have to restart the thing, or is there a way to either force
a re-reading of the config file, or to simply add mibs by
manually...trying to simply run snmpset returns an error when you try to
set to a mib that doesn't exist...

thanks again,

jason

New port

[Sergey I. Y. <ev...@na...>]

Hi,

I'm porting ucd-snmp to OS/2. 
During porting process some questions appeared and I'd like to know your opinions about it.

First of all I'd like to have this port included with main distribution. How this can be done?

Other issues are more technical:

1. I have found that entire package completely ignores possible problems with function calling 
convention used by different compilers. Although this unlikely a problem in most unixes, this may cause
serious problems when parts of package compiled by one compiler while other parts with other.
This issue can be resolved by adding to all function prototypes, function pointer members in structures
and typedefs some symbol which may be defined to nothing on unix platforms or to something specific 
on OS/2 and Win32 (it also may suffer from this problem). 

Something like this:

typedef int (*CALL_CONV snmp_callback) (int, struct snmp_session *, int, struct snmp_pdu *, void *);

void CALL_CONV snmpv3_authtype_conf(const char *word, char *cptr);

2. Similar issue with alignment of structures. Although there is no standard way to accomplish this,
I think that most current compilers recognizes and able to handle correctly #pragma pack()
In either case compilers that don't recognize this pragma will just ignore it and nothing bad happens.
If to use this approach then each header will have (snmpv3.h used as an example):

#ifndef SNMPV3_H
#define SNMPV3_H

#pragma pack(1)

at the beginning and 

#pragma pack()
#endif /* SNMPV3_H */

at the end.

Comments and opinions are welcome.

Thanks.

Regards,
	Sergey.

*--------------------------------------
ES@Home

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Juergen S. <sc...@ib...>]

>>>>> Frank Strauss writes:

Juergen> So any code which does an automatic conversion based on a
Juergen> best guess is just flawed. And this can have more than
Juergen> unpleasant side effects if it is being used in a VACM
Juergen> configuration file. So please, don't do it.

Frank> Does this mean, you'd prefer to use something like

Frank>  DISMAN-SCRIPT-MIB::smScriptObjects.0.0.0.5.103.165.101.115.116
Frank> ff:8f:c0

Frank> over

Frank>  DISMAN-SCRIPT-MIB::smScriptObjects.0.0.0."guest" ff:8f:c0

Frank> ? (This example uses wildcarding to address multiple tables
Frank> under smScriptObjects. Hence, it is generically impossible for
Frank> the agent to guess `the' indexing scheme.)

If you write DISMAN-SCRIPT-MIB::smScriptObjects.0.0.0."guest", then I
would expect that a good implementation reports an error since it is
ambiguous what it means. On the other hand, if you write something
like DISMAN-SCRIPT-MIB::MIB!smScriptDescr."guest", then a good
implementation can expand this without ambiguities to
1.3.6.1.2.1.64.1.3.1.1.3.5.103.165.101.115.116. 

The fact that you want to do wildcarding tricks here (since there are
several MIB tables with the same indexing structure) is the subject of
the second argument ff:8f:c0. From a VACM perspective,

1.3.6.1.2.1.64.1.3.1.1.3.5.103.165.101.115.116	ff:8f:c0

and

1.3.6.1.2.1.64.1.3.0.0.0.5.103.165.101.115.116  ff:8f:c0

are semantically equivalent.

/js

-- 
Juergen Schoenwaelder      Technical University Braunschweig
<sc...@ib...>  Dept. Operating Systems & Computer Networks
Phone: +49 531 391 3289    Bueltenweg 74/75, 38106 Braunschweig, Germany
Fax:   +49 531 391 5936    <URL:http://www.ibr.cs.tu-bs.de/~schoenw/>

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Frank S. <st...@ib...>]

Juergen> So any code which does an automatic conversion based on a best guess
Juergen> is just flawed. And this can have more than unpleasant side effects if
Juergen> it is being used in a VACM configuration file. So please, don't do it.

Does this mean, you'd prefer to use something like

 DISMAN-SCRIPT-MIB::smScriptObjects.0.0.0.5.103.165.101.115.116 ff:8f:c0

over

 DISMAN-SCRIPT-MIB::smScriptObjects.0.0.0."guest" ff:8f:c0

? (This example uses wildcarding to address multiple tables under
smScriptObjects. Hence, it is generically impossible for the agent to
guess `the' indexing scheme.)

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Juergen S. <sc...@ib...>]

In article <sde...@wa...> you wrote:
>>>>>> On 21 Nov 2000 22:29:34 -0000, ni...@ba... (Niels Baggesen) said:

> Wes> 8:24am wanderer [189]: ./snmptranslate -IR system.\"blue\"
> Wes> Unknown object identifier: system."blue"

> Niels> That was not intended, I will fix it (although I have
> Niels> difficulty seing the use for it)

> That wasn't a good example.  A better example would be a table that I
> don't have a mib for (possibly because it hasn't been written to match
> the code for yet).  I'd certainly want to be able to easily index oids
> based on values even though the first half of them were entirely
> numeric.

This is _NOT_ possible. You need to know how a table is indexed to form
the instance identifier. In particular, you need to know whether a string
is fixed length or not. If it is variable length, then you need to know
whether an implied bit applies.

So any code which does an automatic conversion based on a best guess
is just flawed. And this can have more than unpleasant side effects if
it is being used in a VACM configuration file. So please, don't do it.

/js

-- 
Juergen Schoenwaelder      Technical University Braunschweig
<sc...@ib...>  Dept. Operating Systems & Computer Networks
Phone: +49 531 391 3289    Bueltenweg 74/75, 38106 Braunschweig, Germany
Fax:   +49 531 391 5936    <URL:http://www.ibr.cs.tu-bs.de/~schoenw/>

Re: read_objid() capability to interpret strings

[Frank S. <st...@ib...>]

niels> Like this?

niels> $ apps/snmptranslate 99.13.14.\"guf\".8
niels> .1.3.6.1.2.1.99.13.14.3.103.117.102.8
niels> $

Great! ;-)

Re: rmon possibilities?

[Dave S. <D.T...@cs...>]

>                                                       essentially, the
> goal of all of this is to send out traps based on certain values being
> exceeded/reached elsewhere in the MIBs (so if someone knows of another way
> to do this, please advise!)...

This is actually one of the goals of the Distributed Management working
group (DisMan).   There are a series of MIBs (most specifically the
Event MIB) that are designed to provide exactly this facility.
   They build on the concepts of the RMON work, but are aimed at a more
general monitoring facility.

  And before you ask, no the UCD/Net-SNMP agent doesn't support these
either.  A number of people (including me) have been making noises about
implementing these MIBs, but it hasn't happened yet.
   But that's perhaps the most primising line of approach for your needs.
Full RMON support has a number of other knotty problems (like promiscuous
access and analysis of all network traffic).

Dave