Generic Switch monitoring and management plugin
Verax NMS Generic Switch management plugin allows easy monitoring, alerting, health check, management and
performance reporting of SNMP-enabled switches supporting the following MIBs:
- RFC1213
- BRIDGE
- Q-BRIDGE (optional)
- ENTITY-MIB (optional)
The Generic Switch plugin can communicate using SNMP v1, v2 or v3.
Generic vs. dedicated plugins
The Generic Switch plugin enables monitoring and management of switch types/models that do not have dedicated Verax NMS plugins.
Dedicated plugins come first in the discovery order: if a dedicated plugin exists it is preferred over a generic one.
While the dedicated plugins typically provide additional functionality (display more information, allow for execution of management actions,
configuration management, etc.),
the Generic Switch plugin provides full capability in terms of monitoring, performance measurements and alerting.
Examples of dedicated switch plugins include:
Please refer to the Verax NMS page for more information on specific device support.
General view
The view presents general configuration information about a switch such as:
-
Switch vendor, model and firmware information
-
Name, uptime, location and administrative contact details
-
Interfaces' operational statistics (e.g. numbers of up/down events)
Internet protocol (IP) view
The view displays current IP configuration parameters (such as forwarding, default TTL, reassembly timeout and others)
and statistics (input receives, forwarded datagrams, routing discards and others).
Interfaces view
The view provides an inventory of all network interfaces on a device including:
-
Index and name (e.g. FastEthernet0/0)
-
Type (e.g. ethernetCsmacd)
-
Physical address
-
Administrative and operational statuses
-
Current configuration parameters (e.g. MTU size) and statistics (e.g. packets out, excessive collisions) for each interface
IP addressing view
This view provides a list of all IP addresses configured on a device including: address, mask, interface and broadcast address.
Routing table view
The view displays current IP routing table on a device including:
-
Destination IP address
-
Next hop interface and IP address
-
Route type and type dependent metrics (1 through 5)
-
Protocol describing how the route was learned
-
Age describing how long ago (in seconds) the route was created/modified
This information is displayed only if a managed switch has routing functionality.
Entities view
The view provides detailed information about hardware (entities) on a device including:
-
Name (e.g. motherboard, daughter card slot, chassis, FastEtnernet card, etc.) and description
-
Containment information (e.g. card A is inserted into slot B)
-
Entity class indicating hardware type (e.g. port, module, container, etc.)
-
Hardware, firmware and software revision numbers
-
Manufacturer, model name and serial number
-
Replaceable flag indicating if given piece of hardware is considered to be a FRU (Field Replaceable Unit) or not
This information is only displayed if the device supports the SNMP ENTITY-MIB.
Standard MIBs
The Generic Switch supports the standard MIB-2, enabling NMS to define sensors, performance counters, alarms and traps based on
standard MIB definitions.
Loading vendor MIBs
Additional MIBs can be loaded via NMS MIB Browser. OIDs from these MIBs can be used to define additional
sensors and performance counters as needed.
Predefined monitoring templates
The plugin contains predefined templates for most commonly monitored switch items.
Most important, selected templates are provided in the table below (other, additional sensors and performance counters
can be added by the user):
| Generic Switch Interface Input traffic |
| Generic Switch Interface Output Traffic |
| Generic Switch Interface Inbound Non-unicast Packets |
| Generic Switch Interface Outbound Non-unicast Packets |
| Generic Switch Interface Traffic Ratio |
| Generic Switch Interface Unicast Ratio |
| Generic Switch Interface Discarded Packets Ratio |
| Generic Switch Interface Packets With Errors Ratio |
| Generic Switch IP Input Receives |
| Generic Switch IP Input Headers Errors |
| Generic Switch IP Input Address Errors |
| Generic Switch IP Forwarded Datagrams |
| Generic Switch IP Input Unknown Protocols |
| Generic Switch IP Input Discards |
| Generic Switch IP Input Delivers |
| Generic Switch IP Output Requests |
| Generic Switch IP Output Discards |
| Generic Switch IP Output No Routes |
| Generic Switch IP Reassembly Received Fragments |
| Generic Switch IP Reassembly OKs |
| Generic Switch IP Reassembly Fails |
| Generic Switch IP Fragmentation OKs |
| Generic Switch IP Fragmentation Fails |
| Generic Switch IP Fragmentation Creates |
| Generic Switch IP Routing Discards |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Messages |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Errors |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Destination Unreachs |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Time Exceeds |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Parameter Problems |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Source Quenches |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Redirects |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Echos |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Echo Replies |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Timestamps |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Timestamp Replies |
| Generic Switch ICMP Input Address Mask Request Replies |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Messages |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Errors |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Destination Unreachs |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Time Exceeds |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Parameter Problems |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Source Quenches |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Redirects |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Echos |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Echo Replies |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Timestamps |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Timestamp Replies |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Address Masks Requests |
| Generic Switch ICMP Output Address Mask Request Replies |
| Generic Switch TCP Active Opens |
| Generic Switch TCP Passive Opens |
| Generic Switch TCP Attempt Fails |
| Generic Switch TCP Closes |
| Generic Switch TCP Current Established |
| Generic Switch TCP Input Segments |
| Generic Switch TCP Output Segments |
| Generic Switch TCP Retransmitted Segments |
| Generic Switch TCP Input Errors |
| Generic Switch TCP Output RSTs Flags |
| Generic Switch UDP Input Datagrams |
| Generic Switch UDP No Application At Port |
| Generic Switch UDP Input Errors |
| Generic Switch UDP Output Datagrams |
Performance counters and alarming
All the above parameters can be added as sensors/performance counters within Verax NMS and configured for alarming.
Event processing
Verax NMS provides a set of standard, built-in event processing rules for MIB-2. Additional rules can be defined
based on standard and vendor-specific MIB OIDs.
See also
Generic Router monitoring and management plugin 
Generic Firewall monitoring and management plugin
Generic Printer monitoring and management plugin
Generic UPS monitoring and management plugin
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