ISPPlanet • Budget Network Management System Series - Wrap-Up

Device Control
Knowing what's happening in your network is only half the battle. Taking proactive or corrective action can be even more challenging—particularly when your beeper goes off at 2:00 am. Most full-featured SNMP managers can issue SET commands, useful when the device agent supports remote control through MIB objects. Three of the entry-level products we tested support SNMP SET.

Vendor	ACE*COMM	MediaHouse	SNMP ToolChest Company	MG-SOFT	Ipswitch	Castle Rock Computing
Product	NetPlus AutoManage	ipMonitor	SNMP ToolChest	MIB Browser NetInspector LITE	WhatsUp Gold	SNMPc
SNMP SET	Single object Multiple objects	No	No	Single object	No	Single object Multiple objects
Telnet Cut-Thru	No	No	No	No	Yes	Yes
NT Service Restart	No	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No
Auto-Execution of Program on Alert	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes
Network Utilities					NetTools	TFTP Bootp

SNMP SET can be helpful, but is not a magic wand. Many device parameters cannot be modified through SNMP. Config file rollback, NT service restart, and reboot often require another interface. The most common remote control interface today is Telnet CLI access, followed closely by web GUI access. It is therefore not surprising we found non-SNMP control features in several tested products. When triggered by alerts, three can restart NT services remotely and three can launch external programs or scripts. For added convenience, WhatsUp Gold and SNMPc launch Telnet directly from map nodes and provide integrated network utilities.

Pt. 1: Introduction / What We Tested	Pt. 5: Device Control
Pt. 2: Installation & Setup	> Pt. 6: Network Montoring & Alerts
Pt. 3: Network Discovery	Pt. 7: Reporting
Pt. 4: SNMP Browse and Query <	Pt. 8: Product Support / Overall Evaluation