A distributed approach to lan monitoring using intelligent high performance monitors

As Local Area Networks (LAN's) continue to grow in acceptance, they are quickly becoming the local data communication backbone of corporations. Their popularity is a result of the high bandwidth offered (>1 Mbps) and the multiaccess nature of the medium. At the lowest level, LAN's are used to interconnect computers, terminals and peripherals, allowing these devices to easily intercommunicate via a high bandwidth backbone [1]. At a higher level they are used to interconnect members of a distributed system. In systems such as the V-Kernel [2], the LAN supports the distribution of work among servers dedicated to specific functions.