About SNMP Informant Data Providers
How does SNMP Informant work?
SNMP Informant works by translating external SNMP request messages into local system calls.
SNMP Informant is a technology commonly known as a Windows SNMP Extension Agent. What this means is that SNMP Informant requires a base SNMP service or "stack" before it can operate.
Windows Operating Systems come equipped with an SNMP service, which can be selected as part of the base OS install. When that SNMP service is installed, only SOME data is made available to SNMP.
SNMP Informant is installed after the Windows SNMP service, enabling Windows to reply to SNMP request messages in a way it never could before.
 If you have heard that Microsoft has deprecated SNMP with the release of Windows 2012, and are wondering how that might impact your SNMP-based network monitoring infrastructure, or if you are are looking to secure your Windows Server SNMP exposure, click here. |
SNMP Informant consists of four different data provider types. Each provider type is specifically designed to efficiently convert an external SNMP request message into a local PDH, WMI, customer or server-specific application query. Click on the provider type links on the left to find out more.
Once you have SNMP Informant installed, you need to copy and compile the included MIBs (Management Information Bases) into your Network Management Station. That's so your NMS can query them. If you are not up on SNMP, a great overview can be found on the Paessler Knowledge Base:
Once you have your MIBs compiled into your NMS, you can target the servers you have SNMP Informant installed on and query SNMP Informant OIDs (Object IDs) that translate to data provider objects. For a little more detail on SNMP Informant Object IDs, click here.
- Performance Data Provider - This provider bridges SNMP requests to and from the location Performance subsystem.
- Windows Management Instrumentation Provider - This provider bridges SNMP requests to and from the location WMI subsystem.
- Server Specific Provider - This provider bridges SNMP requests to and from a specific server application program.
- Custom Provider - This provider bridges SNMP requests to and from custom data providers, including registry, script execution results, custom performance counters and custom WMI classes.
