Customized network management based on applications requirements

To manage current network environments we have to change the existent network and systems management paradigms, if we even can admit that one exists. Network Management shouldnot be restricted to protocols, MIB definition, and associated instrumentation. In the end, what is really important is to satisfy user application requirements. One should note that blindly monitoring raw MIB data values has not proven to be very useful to fix day to day network management problems. The reason is seen to be that the gap between raw MIB data values and root causes of problems is in most cases too important to tackle. Therefore, in order to drastically reduce the amount of root causes analysis processing, some kind of heuristics must be introduced. This paper proposes a framework based on the integration of user application requirements into the NMS process. From the architectural point of view, the framework is based on intermediate management systems – the so-called Intelligent Agents – which serve as management front-ends to user applications.