JPH04308951A - Network management system - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To unnecessitate making a request for obtaining the name of a network resource to an entire agent system each time a request for obtaining management information made from a manager system. CONSTITUTION:As for a network management system in which plural agent systems 15 which manage each network resource 13 are connected with a manager system 2, the manager system and the plural agent system are respectively equipped with management information processors l and 16 including management information storing areas 6 and 12, management information processing means 4 and 10, and management information inquiring means 5 and 11. When specific information concerned with the network resource is changed in the agent system, the manager system fetches the changed information, stores it in the management information storing area, and refers it when receiving the request for obtaining the management information. Thus, the deterioration of an answering speed for the inquiry can be suppressed, and a processing efficiency can be improved.

Description

[Detailed description of the invention]

0001

FIELD OF INDUSTRIAL APPLICATION The present invention is utilized for processing management information in a network management system.

[0002] The present invention provides a network in which management information is sent and received between a manager system and an agent system, and the agent system directly manages the actual network resources under which the network resources are managed, in order to centrally manage the elements constituting the network. Regarding management systems.

0003

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, in a network management system that implements a manager and agent model, the agent system notifies the manager system of all management information and has a simple pass-through function. However, as network configurations expand and become more diverse, there is a limit to the ability of the manager system to manage all of the network management information.The agent system manages the network management information in a distributed manner, and the manager system A model was established in which inquiries were made to the agent system, and all management information was held by the agent system.

[0004] Furthermore, in order for the manager system to know where network resources exist, it requests the agent system to obtain all information and obtains a list of network resources under the agent system.

[0005]

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] In the conventional management information storage method described above, since the agent system has to inquire about all information, each time an inquiry is made, transmission and reception occurs to and from multiple agent systems. This has the drawback of significantly slowing down the response processing speed.

[0006] The present invention is intended to solve such problems, and aims to provide a system that eliminates the need to inquire of the agent system every time a request is made from a management program and can process a response in a short time. shall be.

[0007]

[Means for Solving the Problems] The present invention provides a manager system having a management program means and a communication control unit, and a plurality of agent systems each having a communication control unit and managing a plurality of network resources connected via a line. In the network management system, each of the manager system and the plurality of agent systems includes a management information storage area for storing management information of the plurality of network resources, and a request for obtaining management information of the network resources from the management program means. management information processing means for executing an inquiry process when received; and management information inquiry means for searching whether or not management information of the network resource is stored in the management information storage area according to instructions from the management information processing means. The present invention is characterized by comprising a management information processing device including:

The management information processing device of the manager system includes a control table for identifying the management relationship between the network resources and the agent system, and the management information inquiry means of the manager system makes a request by referring to the control table. It is preferable that the network resource includes means for acquiring the name of an agent that manages the network resource.

[0009]

[Operation] When specific information regarding network resources is changed in the agent system, the manager system captures the changed information and holds it in the management information storage area, and the management information held when receiving a management information acquisition request. Eliminates the need to refer to all agent systems each time a management information acquisition request is made.

[0010] Furthermore, in order to identify under which agent a network resource is managed, a program corresponding to the network resource is installed in advance, so that the network management of the manager system is improved when controlling network resource information. It is possible to uniformly access management information without making any distinction from the program means.

[0011]

Embodiments Next, embodiments of the present invention will be explained based on the drawings.

(First Embodiment) FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a first embodiment of the present invention.

In the first embodiment of the present invention, a plurality of agent systems 15 having a communication control section 9 and managing a plurality of network resources 13 are connected to a line 8 in a manager system 2 having a management program means 3 and a communication control section 7. Further, as a feature of the present invention, the manager system 2 and the plurality of agent systems 15 each have management information storage areas 6 and 12 for storing management information of the plurality of network resources 13, and a management program means 3. Management information processing means 4 and 10 execute inquiry processing when receiving a request for acquisition of management information of network resources 13 from the management information storage areas 6 and 12 according to instructions from the management information processing means 4 and 10. Management information processing apparatuses 1 and 16 each include management information inquiry means 5 and 11 for searching whether or not management information of resource 13 is stored.

Next, the operation of the first embodiment of the present invention constructed as described above will be explained. FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing the overall flow of operations in the embodiment of the present invention.

When the management information processing means 4 receives a management information acquisition request for a certain network resource 13 from the management program means 3, it determines whether or not the management information for the requested network resource 13 is held in the management information storage area 6. An inquiry is made to the management information inquiry means 5. The management information inquiry means 5 searches the management information storage area 6, and if the management information is held, returns the management information to the management information processing means 4, and the management information processing means 4 sends the information to the management program means 3 in response to the acquisition request. to be returned.

When the management information inquiry means 5 notifies the management information storage area 6 that no management information is held as a result of searching the management information storage area 6, the management information processing means 4 sends an inquiry to the agent system 15 via the communication control section 7. Issue a control command to request the acquisition of management information.

When the agent system 15 receives an acquisition request from the manager system 2, the agent system 15 sends the management information processing means 1
0 issues a request to the management information inquiry means 11 to obtain the requested information. Management information inquiry means 11
searches the management information storage area 12, and if the management information is held, returns that management information, and if it is not held, directly searches for information in the network resource 13.

When the information on the network resource 13 is acquired, the management information processing means 10 responds the management information to the manager system 2 via the communication control section 9. The communication control unit 7 of the manager system 2 is connected to the agent system 1
5, the response is returned to the management information processing means 4, and the management information processing means 4 returns the response to the management program means 3.

As explained above, if the manager system 2 holds the management information in the management information storage area 6, it can immediately obtain the management information without inquiring the agent system 15 via the line 8. but,
In this case, rules exist for the operation between the management information processing means 4 of the manager system 2 and the management information processing means 10 of the agent system 15.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing the flow of management information between management information processing means in an embodiment of the present invention. The operation rules will be explained with reference to FIG.

The management information processing device 1 of the manager system 2 holds specific management information in a management information storage area 6. When creation, deletion, or modification occurs in the network resource 13, the management information processing device 16 of the agent system 15
is the management information storage area 1 for the management information inquiry means 11.
At the same time, a management information change notification 29 is issued to the manager system 2.

The management information processing device 1 of the manager system 2 receives the management information change notification 2 from the agent system 15.
9, it sends an instruction to change the management information to the management information inquiry means 5.

(Second Embodiment) FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a second embodiment of the present invention.

In the second embodiment of the present invention, when the manager system 2 acquires information regarding a specific network resource 13, it requests the acquisition of all the list of network resources 13 under the agent system 15, and In order to eliminate the need to make inquiries to the system 15, the management information inquiry means 5 of the manager system 2 provides a control table 14 in the management information processing device 1 that indicates for each piece of management information which agent holds the management information.

When the management information processing means 4 receives a request to obtain information regarding a specific network resource 13 from the management program means 3, it issues a request to the management information inquiry means 5 to obtain management information. The management information inquiry means 5 refers to the control table 14 as shown in FIG. 5, searches the management information storage area 6 if there is a retention flag, obtains the name of the agent that manages the requested network resource 13, and issues the management program. A response is returned to means 3.

If there is no holding flag, the management information processing means 4 is notified, and the management information processing means 4 recognizes where it is necessary to inquire based on the agent name, and issues a control command via the communication control section 7. By issuing the information acquisition request, an information acquisition request is issued to the agent system 15. In response to this request, the agent system 15 searches for resources and sends management information to the manager system 2. The inquiry means 5 which received the management information returns a response to the management program means 3.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing the contents of a control table according to the second embodiment of the present invention. The control table 14 contains the network resource name 32
, an agent name 33, a retention flag 34, and a relationship 35 between network resources, where the network resource name 32 is the name of the network resource, the agent name 33 is the name of the agent that manages the network resource, and the retention flag 34 is the name of the network resource. A flag indicating whether the manager system 2 has it or whether to inquire to the agent and a relationship 35 of the network resource 13 store information when a certain relationship exists between network resources.

[0028]

As explained above, according to the present invention, the manager system always receives information change notification regarding specific information from the agent system, so that the agent system In addition, by managing the name of the agent system that manages a specific network resource, it is possible to eliminate the need to request the acquisition of the network resource name from all agent systems under the manager system. It has the effect of

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a first embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing the overall flow of operations in the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing the flow of management information between management information processing means in the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a second embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing the operation flow of the inquiry means according to the second embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing the configuration of a control table according to a second embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

1, 16 Management information processing device 2 Manager system 3 Management program means 4, 10 Management information processing means 5, 11 Management information inquiry means 6, 12 Management information storage area 7, 9 Communication control section 8 Line 13 Network resources 14 Control table 15 Agent system

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A network management system in which a plurality of agent systems each having a communication control unit and managing a plurality of network resources are connected via a line to a manager system having a management program means and a communication control unit, wherein the manager system has a management program means and a communication control unit. Each of the system and the plurality of agent systems includes a management information storage area for storing management information of the plurality of network resources, and a management information storage area for storing management information of the plurality of network resources; A management information processing device including a management information processing means to be executed, and a management information inquiry means for searching whether management information of the network resource is stored in the management information storage area according to an instruction from the management information processing means. A network management system characterized by: 2. The management information processing device of the manager system includes a control table for identifying a management relationship between the network resource and the agent system, and the management information inquiry means of the manager system refers to the control table. 2. The network management system according to claim 1, further comprising means for acquiring the name of an agent that manages the requested network resource.