b-based management across multiple domains like enterprise, tele- com, and storage. 18.2 XMLP Overview Let us start with the XML protocol (XMLP) requirements from the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). XMLP according to W3C is a lightweight protocol that is used for exchanging structured management information in a distributed environment. The key advantages of using XML protocol are: Usage of XML for information exchange, which brings with it a wealth of readily available convertors, parsers, and other development and implementa- tion toolsets. XML protocol ensures that management information can be defined in an easy, flexible, and powerful manner. XMLP provides a message construct that can be exchanged over a variety of underlying protocols. This makes it independent of the underlying transport protocol and suited for situations where an extensible lean transport protocol is required. One of the focuses of the XML protocol work group (WG) was to ensure the transport protocol independence. XML-Based Protocols XML is well suited for distributed environments where there are inbuilt mechanisms for usage scenarios on involving multiple data readers, multiple data writers, and other control entities. XMLP provides flexible linkages between managed object and management application. This is again a projection of the distributed nature of XMLP. XML protocol provides a strong security paradigm with capabilities for auto- matic and centralized validation. The intent of defining requirements on XML protocol (XMLP) was to create a foun- dation protocol whose definition will remain simple and stable over time. The design based on this foundation that explicitly used modularity and layering will assure longevity and subsequent extension of the design keeping the foundation intact. XMLP inherently supports the following: Message encryption: This means that the message header and the associated payload can be encrypted when using XML protocol. Multiple intermediaries: The protocol support third-party intermediary com- municatio