1. Munich IETF, August 1997 Fluid A Java Version of Nifty Siegfried Löffler siegfried.loeffler@rus.uni-stuttgart.de Rechenzentrum Universität Stuttgart

2. Rechenzentrum der Universität Stuttgart - Communication Systems / BelWue Development Outline n Existing Tools for Web Based Network Management n Advent Network Management n Why Java? n Problems with the Java Security Mechanism n Our Implementation: The FLuid Applet n New Perspectives / Ideas for Flow display using FLuid n Conclusions

3. Rechenzentrum der Universität Stuttgart - Communication Systems / BelWue Development Web based Network Management n Trend: Network Management-Tools use the WWW as User Interface n Projects: IBM (Webbin CMIP), Cisco, 3com, Microsoft (WBEM), Ipsilon, and others - Usually limited to the (static) display of SNMP counters. n Java for Real Time Applications in Web Browsers

4. Rechenzentrum der Universität Stuttgart - Communication Systems / BelWue Development Advent Network Management Java-based Network Management Products (http://www.adventnet.com) n Products include NetMonitor: Toolkit to create own SNMP Java Applets with a visual builder (Generates Java Code) n SNMPv2c Class Libraries

5. Rechenzentrum der Universität Stuttgart - Communication Systems / BelWue Development Why Java? n Programming for the Web: CGI, JavaScript, Java. n CGI programs runs on Web Server and produce HTML output (static). n Java Programs allow non-static interaction. n Platform inde- pendent (Portable Bytecode). Client Machine Server Machine CGI Internet Server Machine Web Server Client Machine Internet Java VM CGI Progams run on Web Server: Java Programs run in Client Web Browser: Program I/O Path over which the Program is Loaded

6. Rechenzentrum der Universität Stuttgart - Communication Systems / BelWue Development Java Security n Socket Connections are only allowed to Web Server (where Code has been loaded from) or to local machine. n Solution: Secure Applet Server (SAS) runs on Web Server and redirects SNMP traffic. Server Machine Web Server Client Machine Internet Java VM SNMP APPLET Java VM SAS SERVER SNMP Agent SNMP Traffic

7. Rechenzentrum der Universität Stuttgart - Communication Systems / BelWue Development FLuid: A Java Version of nifty n Display of the current Traffic on the Network in Real Time inside of a Web Browser. n Does not yet implement all functionality that nifty offers, Y axis is always showing PDU count. n Reads ca. 300 flow records in 10 seconds n Object-Oriented Code should allow integration into a web- based management environment.

8. Rechenzentrum der Universität Stuttgart - Communication Systems / BelWue Development FLuid / Flow Information n Child window for each flow, updated after each query. n Currently those windows can just display counters for the selected flows. It would be interesting to allow creation of graphs etc.

9. Rechenzentrum der Universität Stuttgart - Communication Systems / BelWue Development Conclusions / Outlook n Possible to write RTFM applications / applets in Java - Security Restrictions can be resolved, Java is fast enough to transfer the packaged flow table in a reasonable time. n Object Oriented Effort useful (Code Reuse) - Network Management Applications usually have to be customized to fulfill the local requirements. n Implementation works, but does not yet offer the full functionality of nifty. n Code should be regarded as an Example of how things can be realized in Java - Not as a complete class library that can be re-used.