Textual Conventions for Version 2 of the Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMPv2)
RFC - Draft Standard (January 1996; No errata)
Obsoleted by RFC 2579
Obsoletes RFC 1443
Was draft-ietf-snmpv2-tc-ds (snmpv2 WG)
RFC 1903 (Draft Standard)
Network Working Group                               SNMPv2 Working Group
Request for Comments: 1903                                       J. Case
Obsoletes: 1443                                      SNMP Research, Inc.
Category: Standards Track                                  K. McCloghrie
M. Rose
Dover Beach Consulting, Inc.
S. Waldbusser
International Network Services
Textual Conventions
for Version 2 of the
Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMPv2)
This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the
improvements.  Please refer to the current edition of the "Internet
Official Protocol Standards" (STD 1) for the standardization state
and status of this protocol.  Distribution of this memo is unlimited.
1. Introduction ................................................    1
1.1 A Note on Terminology ......................................    2
2. Definitions .................................................    3
3. Mapping of the TEXTUAL-CONVENTION macro .....................   19
3.1 Mapping of the DISPLAY-HINT clause .........................   19
3.2 Mapping of the STATUS clause ...............................   21
3.3 Mapping of the DESCRIPTION clause ..........................   21
3.4 Mapping of the REFERENCE clause ............................   21
3.5 Mapping of the SYNTAX clause ...............................   22
4. Security Considerations .....................................   22
5. Editor's Address ............................................   22
6. Acknowledgements ............................................   22
7. References ..................................................   23
A management system contains:  several (potentially many) nodes, each
with a processing entity, termed an agent, which has access to
management instrumentation; at least one management station; and, a
management protocol, used to convey management information between
the agents and management stations.  Operations of the protocol are
carried out under an administrative framework which defines
SNMPv2 Working Group        Standards Track                     [Page 1]
RFC 1903             Textual Conventions for SNMPv2         January 1996
authentication, authorization, access control, and privacy policies.
Management stations execute management applications which monitor and
control managed elements.  Managed elements are devices such as
hosts, routers, terminal servers, etc., which are monitored and
controlled via access to their management information.
Management information is viewed as a collection of managed objects,
residing in a virtual information store, termed the Management
Information Base (MIB).  Collections of related objects are defined
in MIB modules.  These modules are written using a subset of OSI's
Abstract Syntax Notation One (ASN.1) [1], termed the Structure of
Management Information (SMI) [2].
When designing a MIB module, it is often useful to define new types
similar to those defined in the SMI.  In comparison to a type defined
in the SMI, each of these new types has a different name, a similar
syntax, but a more precise semantics.  These newly defined types are
termed textual conventions, and are used for the convenience of
humans reading the MIB module.  It is the purpose of this document to
define the initial set of textual conventions available to all MIB
modules.
Objects defined using a textual convention are always encoded by
means of the rules that define their primitive type.  However,
textual conventions often have special semantics associated with
them.  As such, an ASN.1 macro, TEXTUAL-CONVENTION, is used to
concisely convey the syntax and semantics of a textual convention.
For all textual conventions defined in an information module, the
name shall be unique and mnemonic, and shall not exceed 64 characters
in length.  (However, names longer than 32 characters are not
recommended.) All names used for the textual conventions defined in
all "standard" information modules shall be unique.
1.1.  A Note on Terminology
For the purpose of exposition, the original Internet-standard Network
Management Framework, as described in RFCs 1155 (STD 16), 1157 (STD
15), and 1212 (STD 16), is termed the SNMP version 1 framework
(SNMPv1).  The current framework is termed the SNMP version 2