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Network Management. Network management is the process that keeps the underlying networking layer healthy. This requirement is not specifically addressed by the EMA initiatives because it is handled by a variety of tools and techniques geared to the management of network devices such as routers, hubs, and network bridges.

AN OVERVIEW OF MESSAGE MANAGEMENT CONCEPTS

A network management architecture typically consists of a manager, an agent, a managed information base, and protocols.

Manager. The term manager refers to a set of tools and utilities that reside on a management station — typically a workstation with a graphical interface — and that allow administrators to monitor and actively manage the network. The manager software sends commands to the agent software residing on the managed components.

Agent. The term agent is used generically to refer to software that resides on the managed component (e.g., messaging transfer agents, directories, and gateways) and that interacts with the manager station at regular intervals. Typically, the agent collects a set of statistics on the status of the monitored component and responds to polling requests from the manager.

Agents may also be designed to initiate direct communication with the manager to report a specific problem situation through the use of alarms. Alarms allow administrators to act quickly to recover from error situations.

Managed Information Base. The MIB provides a common data model for what specific data is collected, monitored, or reset at the managed component site. The MIB is shared by the manager and agents.

Protocols. The manager and agent exchange information through a common set of protocols. The most popular network management protocols in use today are SNMP, which was developed within the Internet community, and CMIS/CMIP, which was developed as part of the OSI suite of protocols.


Exhibit 2.  Messaging Management Architecture.

MESSAGING MANAGEMENT ARCHITECTURE

Exhibit 2 illustrates a typical messaging management architecture. A management SYSCON runs a manager application that polls the messaging system components for status information continually. These components can be message stores, post offices, gateways, message transfer agent, message switches, or directory service agents. The manager software is also capable of configuring local and remote components.

Configuration capabilities include modifying the routing tables and creating new user accounts. The managed component runs an application called an agent that administers a set of managed objects stored in its MIB. When thresholds or errors impact specific managed objects, the agent sends alarms to the manager software.

MESSAGE MANAGEMENT FROM A SINGLE LOCATION

The following model for messaging management is based on an implementation by Infonet Software Solutions, Inc. called the Messenger 400 Management Control Center. However, the architectural concepts and functional capabilities described are relevant to most client/server management systems designed to provide enterprisewide message management from a single location. The overall system architecture consists of:

  The control center management console.
  Agents communicating to the control center, residing on all key managed components such as message switches, gateways, and directory services.
  A specialized transactions-based protocol for manager-to-agent communication.

Functional Description

From a single workstation, administrators can remotely manage messaging servers and directory servers across an entire wide-area distributed network. Messaging servers can be configured remotely, and users can be added and deleted on local and remote servers. The administrator can also monitor queues of message traffic at gateways, arrange to receive alarms when an undeliverable message enters the system, troubleshoot for performance bottlenecks, and retrieve logs and statistics from all message servers for further analysis.

Because of the number of environments that are being monitored, it is critical that the administrative interface be graphical and visually informative. A Motif-based graphical display allows the administrator to visually organize information about different sites according to personal preference. From such a display, the administrator can set up connections with multiple MTAs, view and configure local and RMTA databases and log files, and monitor incoming alarm messages from messaging or directory server installations.

The control center console can be used to display message traffic for a MTA. Message traffic can be graphically represented on the console, displaying statistics such as the number and volume of messages received and transmitted and changes in transmitted message volume. From the display, the administrator can determine the location of performance bottlenecks such as a long queue at a gateway or a failed message. Tools are also provided to allow the administrator to automate backup of messages stored on remote servers.

It is important that the control center console be able to manage messaging traffic over both SMTP and X.400 networks, using either TCP/IP or X.25 protocols. This allows companies to use existing network infrastructures and also provides an alternative network connection to a messaging server should the normal connection fail.

Control center management information can be logged so information such as cumulative volume of messages and traffic patterns is available for billing purposes, management reports, and system performance tuning.

Control Center Console Software

The control center management console and agents implement the Madman MIB. As products from other vendors converge on the adoption of this important industry standard, it will be possible to manage messaging and directory servers in a multivendor site through a single management console product.

The control center management console’s software consists of two main modules that can operate concurrently — the control center manager and the alarm system. The manager module spawns multiple message traffic monitoring and administration programs. These programs attach to the remote message transfer agent and store the data needed for maintaining access to these managed message transfer agents in a simple ASCII database file, stored on the console host.

The manager software resides on a UNIX workstation, which can be connected to any message transfer agents in the enterprise via X.25 or TCP/IP. Agent software is collocated with the message transfer agents on each of the managed servers.


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