Utilizing the SNA Alert in the management of multivendor networks

Managing multivendor networks is one of the largest challenges facing vendors and customers in data processing and telecommunications. This paper focuses on one aspect of managing multivendor network environments: problem notification, isolation, and resolution, via Systems Network Architectures Alert. It describes an extension to the SNA Alert function, termed the generic Alert, that makes it possible for various vendors products, as well as customer-written applications, to send Alerts of the same type to a single Alert receiver. It also describes IBM's implementation of the Alert receiver for the System/370, the NetView™ program product. Among the facilities that the generic Alert architecture provides to an Alert sender are the following: (1) code points that index short descriptions of Alert conditions, probable causes of these conditions, and recommended operator actions; and (2) vehicles to carry product-unique text. This text can be used for further characterizing an Alert condition or specifying a particular operator action.