Newsletter sign-up

View all newsletters

Sign up for our technology specific newsletters.

Enterprise Java

Email Address:

Java brings new opportunity to network management

Network applications development will become easier and cheaper with Java

By George Lawton, JavaWorld.com, 12/01/96

Page 3 of 4

Java devices are here

Companies already have started to announce Java for devices. Sahara Networks is porting Java to its ATM access devices. In addition to traditional SNMP network management reporting capabilities, Sahara is embedding a Java and HTTP Internet server into its new line of ATM access devices. Network managers will be able to determine the status of any device on the network using an HTTP and Java-compliant browser. In addition, managers can change the kind of information that is gathered from the device and the way it is presented to the viewer, and these changes can be uploaded to any device on the network.

Sahara considered using generic Web technology for this kind of application but opted for Java instead. "Web technology alone was not good enough because that is static. Java is the enabler," said Tim Kraskey, vice president of marketing at Sahara Networks. "Java made things real-time and it embedded security in the information."

Using SaharaView, Sahara's network management application, network administrators with a Java-enabled browser can click on an icon representing a device to bring up a Web page served from that particular device. Given the right security, they can look at data and make changes to the configuration of the device.

Since this architecture uses standard Java and Web calls, companies will be able to add other products to this environment. A historical monitoring server can be programmed to poll the servers at a regular interval for recording data traffic patterns. "Eventually you will be able to use this information for chargebacks and other statistical information," noted Kraskey.

Kraskey believes SNMP will be around for a while, owing to the large embedded base of existing network management systems, but "SNMP management is going away over time. SNMP will still be at the core, but we will go above SNMP," he said. "We have put the Web agent on top so you don't see the limitations of SNMP; you see the real-time GUI and graphics of what HTTP and Java give you."

Companies with extensive SNMP network management in place eventually will migrate, even if their equipment vendors do not choose to support Java. Simplesoft has announced Java support for its SNMP development tools, and SimpleWebManager, a Java applet that communicates directly with SNMP devices. However, the development tools allow users to build client applications only for retrieving, viewing, and uploading SNMP data to network devices; they will not allow the creation of Java applications that run on the devices themselves.

"It will be one more set of functions we can do in Java. Before you needed these heavy operating systems like HP OpenView," said Sameer Jayakar, a spokesman for Simplesoft. "Now with Java management, you will not need all of those tools."

Conclusion

Java-based network management promises to ease the development of network applications and make it cheaper to distribute them throughout the enterprise. "Java will definitely be deployed on the remote side like an insurance company that has a whole bunch of small offices with a LAN in a box where they would not have someone technical onsite," said Martha Young, a market analyst with McConnell Consulting in Boulder, CO. "But they do need technical support, and being able to use Java gives the opportunity to support those remote locations more easily than having to pay an engineer or someone else to be technical."

 

Improve efficiency with Visual Studio(r) 2010 Beta 2. - Microsoft

About Us | Advertise | Contact Us | Terms of Service/Privacy

Copyright, 2006-2008 Network World, Inc. All rights reserved.