The SNMP library contains routines to easily build SNMP agent applications
that use SNMP versions 1 or 2.
Note, however, that it may be even easier to build an
bsnmpd(1)
loadable module, that handles the new MIB (see
snmpmod(3)).
Most of the agent routines operate on a global array that the describes the
complete MIB served by the agent.
This array is held in the two variables:
The user supplied handler for this variable.
The handler is called with the following arguments:
Fa ctx
A pointer to the context (see below).
NULL
Fa val
The value to be set or retrieved.
For GETNEXT and GETBULK operations the oid in
this value is the current OID.
The function (called in this case only for
table rows) must find the lexically next existing OID within the same column and
set the oid and value subfields accordingly.
If the table column is exhausted the
function must return
SNMP_ERR_NOSUCHNAME
For all other operations the oid in
Fa val
is the oid to fetch or set.
Fa len
The length of the base oid without index.
Fa idx
For table columns this is the index expression from the node (see below).
The user handler must return an appropriate SNMP v2 error code.
If the original
PDU was a version 1 PDU, the error code is mapped automatically.
flags
Currently only the flag
SNMP_NODE_CANSET is defined and set for nodes, that can be written or
created.
index
This word describes the index for table columns.
Each part of the index takes 4 bits starting at bit 4.
Bits 0 to 3 hold the number of index parts.
This arrangement allows for tables with up to seven indexes.
Each bit group contains the syntax for the index part.
There are a number of macros to help in parsing this field:
This field may contain arbitrary data and is not used by the library.
The easiest way to construct the node table is
gensnmptree(1).
Note, that one must be careful when changing the tree while executing a SET
operation.
Consult the sources for
bsnmpd(1).
The global variable
snmp_trace
together with the function pointed to by
snmp_debug
help in debugging the library and the agent.
snmp_trace is a bit mask with the following bits:
Setting a bit to true causes the library to call
snmp_debug ();
in strategic places with a debug string.
The library contains a default
implementation for the debug function that prints a message to standard error.
For the node operation callback this is the
index of the variable binding that should be returned if an error occurs.
Set by the library.
In all other functions this is undefined.
scratch
For the node operation callback this is a pointer to a per variable binding
scratch area that can be used to implement the commit and rollback.
Set by the library.
dep
In the dependency callback function (see below) this is a pointer to the
current dependency.
Set by the library.
data
This is the
Fa data
argument from the call to the library and is not used by the library.
The next three functions execute different kinds of GET requests.
The function
snmp_get ();
executes an SNMP GET operation, the function
snmp_getnext ();
executes an SNMP GETNEXT operation and the function
snmp_getbulk ();
executes an SNMP GETBULK operation.
For all three functions the response PDU is constructed and encoded
on the fly.
If everything is ok, the response PDU is returned in
Fa resp
and
Fa resp_b .
The caller must call
snmp_pdu_free ();
to free the response PDU in this case.
One of the following values may be returned:
SNMP_RET_OK
Operation successful, response PDU may be sent.
SNMP_RET_IGN
Operation failed, no response PDU constructed.
Request is ignored.
SNMP_RET_ERR
Error in operation.
The error code and index have been set in
Fa pdu .
No response PDU has been constructed.
The caller may construct an error response PDU via
snmp_make_errresp (.);
The function
snmp_set ();
executes an SNMP SET operation.
The arguments are the same as for the previous
three functions.
The operation of this functions is, however, much more complex.
The SET operation occurs in several stages:
For each binding search the corresponding nodes, check that the
variable is writeable and the syntax is ok.
The writeable check can be done only for scalars.
For columns it must be done in the node's operation callback function.
For each binding call the node's operation callback with function SNMP_OP_SET.
The callback may create dependencies or finalizers (see below).
For simple
scalars the scratch area may be enough to handle commit and rollback, for
interdependent table columns dependencies may be necessary.
If the previous step fails at any point, the node's operation callback
functions are called for all bindings for which SNMP_OP_SET was executed
with SNMP_OP_ROLLBACK, in the opposite order.
This allows all variables to undo the effect of the SET operation.
After this all the dependencies are freed
and the finalizers are executed with a fail flag of 1.
Then the function
returns to the caller with an appropriate error indication.
If the SET step was successful for all bindings, the dependency callbacks
are executed in the order in which the dependencies were created with an
operation of SNMP_DEPOP_COMMIT.
If any of the dependencies fails, all the
committed dependencies are called again in the opposite order
with SNMP_DEPOP_ROLLBACK.
Than for all bindings from the last to the first
the node's operation callback is called with SNMP_OP_ROLLBACK to undo
the effect of SNMP_OP_SET.
At the end the dependencies are freed and the finalizers are called with
a fail flag of 1 and the function returns to the caller with an appropriate
error indication.
If the dependency commits were successful, for each binding the node's
operation callback is called with SNMP_OP_COMMIT.
Any error returned from
the callbacks is ignored (an error message is generated via
snmp_error ().);
Now the dependencies are freed and the finalizers are called
with a fail flag of 0.
For each dependency just before freeing it
its callback is called with
SNMP_DEPOP_FINISH.
Then the function returns
SNMP_ERR_OK
There are to mechanisms to help in complex SET operations: dependencies and
finalizers.
A dependency is used if several bindings depend on each other.
A typical example is the creation of a conceptual row, which requires
the setting of several columns to succeed.
A dependency is identified by
two OIDs.
In the table case, the first oid is typically the table's base OID
and the second one the index.
Both of these can easily be generated from the
variables OID with
asn_slice_oid (.);
The function
snmp_dep_lookup ();
tries to find a dependency based on these two OIDs and, if it cannot find one
creates a new one.
This means for the table example, that the function
returns the same dependency for each of the columns of the same table row.
This allows during the SNMP_OP_SET processing to collect all information
about the row into the dependency.
The arguments to
snmp_dep_lookup ();
are: the two OIDs to identify the dependency (they are copied into newly
created dependencies), the size of the structure to allocate and
the dependency callback.
When all SNMP_OP_SET operations have succeeded the dependencies are executed.
At this stage the dependency callback has all information about the given
table row that was available in this SET PDU and can operate accordingly.
It is guaranteed that each dependency callback is executed at minimum once
- with an operation of
SNMP_OP_ROLLBACK
This ensures that all dynamically allocated resources in a callback can be
freed correctly.
The function
snmp_make_errresp ();
makes an error response if an operation has failed.
It takes the original request PDU (it will look only on the error code and
index fields), the buffer containing the original PDU and a buffer for the
error PDU.
It copies the bindings field from the original PDUs buffer directly to
the response PDU and thus does not depend on the decodability of this field.
It may return the same values as the operation functions.
The next four functions allow some parts of the SET operation to be executed.
This is only used in
bsnmpd(1)
to implement the configuration as a single transaction.
The function
snmp_init_context ();
creates and initializes a context.
The function
snmp_dep_commit ();
executes SNMP_DEPOP_COMMIT for all dependencies in the context stopping at
the first error.
The function
snmp_dep_rollback ();
executes SNMP_DEPOP_ROLLBACK starting at the previous of the current
dependency in the context.
The function
snmp_dep_finish ();
executes SNMP_DEPOP_FINISH for all dependencies.
DIAGNOSTICS
If an error occurs in any of the function an error indication as described
above is returned.
Additionally the functions may call snmp_error on unexpected errors.