Conference azur::mcc

    
    We have put a lot of effort into inter-operating with the DECrouter
    2000.
    
    If you have the privileges, you can monitor and control them from
    DECmcc.
    
    The only thing to watch for is that the DR2000 can only manage one
    management link.  If you set up a lot of alarms rules for instance, 
    be careful not to poll them all at the same time.  Worst case, the
    connect attempts get all tangled up and no links get up.  More likely,
    you will see "insufficent resources at target entity" if you already
    own the link to the DECrouter.  We recommend skewing the polling
    requests to the same system by about thirty seconds if it is a
    single link system.
    
    We haven't spent any significant time working with the X25router or
    the DECnet/SNA gateway.  We should be able to work with them at least
    in their node4 capacity, but I would like to check it out before 
    promising anything.
    
    Other people know what is going on with MTA more accurrately, so I'll
    let them respond.
    
    -Jim Carey
    
    
    

    
    I was just fishing around on the network for an X25router 2000 and
    found one.
    
    I was able to Register it with DECmcc and display a variety of node4, 
    line, and circuit information from it, including DLM information from
    the X.25 circuits.
    
    So, you can definitely monitor the X25router 2000 from DECmcc. 
    I haven't done any control of the X25router, since it is an active
    router in our network.
    
    Remember: DECmcc doesn't support the NCP X25 modules, so that information
    cannot be retrieved using our platform.
    
    Otherwise, I don't see any reason to expect problems.  Okay, not a full
    answer.  I'll see if I can find one that I can get access to for a few
    days and get the whole answer.
    
    -Jim Carey
    
    

    
    Do you have on your X25 router two DLM ? Can you check if 
    the DECnet PA works okwith those two DLMs ? We had submitted
    sometimes ago  a QAR on this , because for PA ,the name of the Circuit  
    had to be the same that the line name (that obviously is
    impossible in the concept of DECnet Data Link Mapping).
    Thanks in advance .
    MaRc

    
    Results of some more hunting around:
    
    	I found two versions of the DECnet/SNA gateway and verified
    	that I can register and monitor both of them using The DECnet
    	AM and DECmcc.  Same limitation that I can't manage anything about
    	them through DNA4 except for their traditional node4 side, but we
    	can register them, access them, and keep them on a map.
    
    Re: -.1
    
    	I haven't tried anything except primitive operations through the
    	AM, so I couldn't tell you about PA performance on them.  However, 
    	some work was going on towards that goal.  I'll see if I can get
    	a response posted in here for you.
    
    -Jim Carey
    

re: .3
    
	The problem with X25 statistics in PA is now fixed.
	PA no longer requires that X25 circuit names match 
	names of the lines the circuits are on. However, this
	restriction is still valid for non-X25 circuits and lines.
	This is because, currently, there is no way for PA to
	get this information from the AM in all cases.

	By the way, we generated statistics for the X25 2000 routers 
	that Jim Carey ran tests on (see responses .1, .2 and .4).

	Does this address your concern?

	/anwar

    
    I have been surprised by the overheads of managing DECrouter 2000s. 
    I am running EFT 1.1.
    
    I have seen as many as 5 logical links from the DECrouter to my
    management station and if I pull DECnet reports I have seen many 
    originating/terminating packets from the DECrouter. I was getting
    worried about these overheads. I only had one alarm and exporting for
    the node information running.
    
    If I had exporting for the circuit and line information as well it
    would have been very worrying.
    
    Has the latest kit affected this ?
    
    Dave
    

    
    The recently announced kit alleviates your concerns somewhat.
    
    Modifications to the DECnet AM can cut that overhead significantly, by
    maintaining certain minimum information about the nodes recently
    accessed.  Testing has shown a reduction in link overhead for
    repetitive requests of close to 70%.  This means that DECmcc responds
    much more quickly, and the network resource consumption is much lower.
    
    Remember though, that there will always be costs associated with
    actively monitoring your network.  Any enterprise manager is confronted
    with the problem of deciding whether information is more valuable than
    the network resources required to collect it.  While we can (and will)
    continue to reduce those costs, there will always be costs associated.
    
    Consider using Alarms "occurs" rules to monitor event information. 
    This significantly reduces resource usage and gives timely information
    about significant events on remote systems.
    
    I hope you're pleased with the steps we've taken in the new kit.
    
    -Jim Carey
    
    
    

By the way, the network management for the DNA Phase IV node part of all the
Phase  IV DEMSA products is identical.  One of the earlier notes says that a
lot  of testing had been performed with the DR2000 -- that testing should be
equally  valid  for  the X25router and the SNA GW.  The only differences are
that the DR2000 insists on being a routing node, the X25router allows either
routing or end node and the SNA GW only permits being an end node (I think).

Similarly the  same  Phase  V  network  management agent is used for all the
Phase V DEMSA products.

Graham

    
    Thanks for the information, Graham.
    
    In answer to the original question: "Yes, DECmcc can manage and control
    the DEMSA family of boxes."
    
    -Jim Carey
    

    >In answer to the original question: "Yes, DECmcc can manage and control
    >the DEMSA family of boxes."
    
  Well, more accurately "Yes, DECmcc can manage and control DECnet in the
  DEMSA family of boxes."

  Kathrin

.0:

>>2. MTA and user agents:
>>	will Message Transfer Agents and user agents manageable from DECmcc ?
>>	are they going to be added into a next release of DECnet/OSI Phase V AM ?

We (the Mail Interchange Group in Reading, UK) are building a 1988 X.400 MTA 
which I don't think has been announced yet.  I don't think I would be saying
anything I shouldn't if I say that "Yes, we fully intend to be EMA compliant,
and be manageable from DECmcc".

Please send me some mail if you want more detailed information, or our Project
Manager John Donovan @REO, or our Product Manager Geoff Oades @REO.

I cannot answer for the User Agents.  I suggest you contact a Product 
Management type from the Mail Program such as Joyce Graff @LKG.  I would guess
that every manageable application in Digital today has a goal to be EMA/MCC 
compliant one day, the only question being 'when?'.

Chris
--
Chris Melling
MTA Development
MIG