The All-New Switch Book: The Complete Guide to LAN Switching Technology, Second Edition

15.1. The Simple Network Management Protocol

When internetwork technology itself was new, product success (along with it the success of the manufacturer of the product) was tied primarily to the operational features and performance characteristics of the networking equipment. As most organizations were not yet critically dependent on the proper operation of their networks, management and fault-detection capabilities were often ignored in favor of having more bells and whistles to list on the competitive data sheet. If network management capability existed at all within a product, it was often added as an afterthought. Any such management features would invariably be vendor- or even product-specific; there was no reason to provide common interoperable network management across equipment from multiple vendors.

During the early 1980s, most networks were extremely small in extent by today's standards. In many cases, a single vendor could supply virtually all of the networking equipment used by a given customer. With the growth of large enterprise networks and the Internet during the late 1980s, it became impossible for any single vendor to provide the breadth of products needed. Manufacturers began to specialize in particular product classes, and large networks would always comprise a mix of equipment — NICs, hubs, bridges, routers, and so on — from different suppliers. As a result, mixed-vendor networks became the rule rather than the exception.

Along with this equipment mix came ...