transfer protocol) and HTML (hyper text mark-up language) FTP - file transfer protocol LDAP - lightweight directory access protocol RADIUS - remote access dial in user service L2TP and L3TP - label 2/3 tunnelling protocol IP security Standards from IT industry CORBA - common object request broker architecture EDI - electronic data interchange XML - extensible mark-up language SSL - secure socket layer SQL - simple query language Network Elements, Managers and Agents When talking about TM we are referring to managed networks. Managed networks consist of a number of network elements or managed devices and a manager. Managed devices collect and store management information for the centralized management entity or man- ager (TM system). They can be routers, access servers, switches, cross-connects, computer hosts, etc. Each managed device has an agent. The agents are software modules residing in a managed device that handle local management information within the device. Managed devices can contain several managed objects. Hardware, configuration param- eters and statistics can be managed objects, if referring to the IETF definition. Managed objects are directly related to the operation of the device. They are arranged in a virtual information database called a management information base (MIB). See Figure 16.6. The manager or management entity executes applications monitoring and controlling managed devices. Management entities provide most of the processing and memory resources required for network management. C++ is used for 'agents' and 'managers' programming. CORBA is a standard for 'managed object' definition and all-to-all manager-agent communication. It is well suited Telecom Management - Operations Management entity TM-MIB Agent Agent Agent Management Management Management database database database Managed devices Figure 16.6 TM basic structure for distributed systems running on different platforms (even written in different languages). This feature opens the possibility to integrate different vendor equipm