In addition to discovering the system, the discovery process also discovers the system’s SNMP agent and adds it to the modeled topology. The discovery process sets the following attributes for the SNMPAgent object:

  • Sets the AgentAddress attribute to the IP address that is used by the initial ICMP poll to reach the system.

  • Sets the AgentAddressList attribute to a list of IP addresses that are discovered on the system. Included in the list is the IP address that is set for the AgentAddress attribute.

    The order of addresses in the list is controlled by the DiscoveryAddrPref and AccessAddressFormat parameters in the discovery.conf file. The DiscoveryAddrPref parameter places the preferred version of addresses (IPv6 or IPv4) at the beginning of the list. And within a list of IPv6 or IPv4 addresses, the AccessAddressFormat parameter places the preferred types of addresses (loopback, Ethernet, and so on) at the beginning of the list.

  • Sets the PortNumber attribute (161 by default) to the port number that is used by the first SNMP poll to successfully communicate with the SNMP agent.

  • Sets the SNMPVersion attribute (AUTODETECT by default) to the version that is used by the first SNMP poll to successfully communicate with the SNMP agent.

  • SNMPv1 or v2c only: Sets the ReadCommunity attribute (public by default) to the read community string that is used by the first SNMP poll to successfully communicate with the SNMPv1 or v2c agent.

  • SNMPv3 only: Sets the attributes that are shown in Values used in SNMP polling to the values that are used by the first SNMP poll to successfully communicate with the SNMPv3 agent.

Table 1. Values used in SNMP polling

Attribute

Description

1  Retrieved from the SNMP polling of this SNMPv3 agent.

User

Name of user that is included in the SNMP request that is sent to this SNMPv3 agent.

AuthPass

Password that is used as the basis for the following: The creation of the localized authentication key that is used with the selected authentication protocol and this SNMPv3 agent. The password is required if the authentication protocol is MD5 or SHA.

The password may be encrypted (recommended) or appear as plain text.

AuthProtocol

Protocol that is used to authenticate the SNMP request that is sent to this SNMPv3 agent: MD5, SHA, or NONE (default).

PrivPass

Password that is used as the basis for the following: The creation of the localized encryption key that is used with the selected privacy protocol and this SNMPv3 agent. The password is required if the privacy protocol is DES or AES.

The password may be encrypted (recommended) or appear as plain text.

PrivProtocol

Protocol that is used to encrypt the SNMP request that is sent to this SNMPv3 agent: DES, AES, or NONE (default).

EngineID

Identifier that uniquely identifies the SNMP engine of this SNMPv3 agent; for example, 800002b804616263.

EngineBoots 1

Number of times that the SNMP engine of this SNMPv3 agent has initialized or reinitialized since its last configuration.

EngineBootTime 1

Date and time that the SNMP engine of this SNMPv3 agent last initialized or reinitialized.

  • Sets the sysName, sysDescr, sysObjectID, sysContact, and sysLocation attributes to the sysName, sysDescr, sysObjectID, sysContact, and sysLocation values that are retrieved from the first SNMP poll to successfully communicate with the SNMP agent.

  • Sets many other SNMP agent attributes in accordance to the values that are found by the discovery probes.