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14.1.9 CiscoSAA measurement servers

The Cisco SAA measurement server is an active and optionally discoverable PVSR module. The measurement server can function in two ways, both of which can occur within the same equipment:

· Discovery mode: the PVSR can discover the SAA measurements in the router and can collect their data

· Non-discovery mode: the PVSR can configure the routers, provided that this operation is enabled, based on the measurements created with its own interface.

The measurement server takes into account both the timeout and retry values set for the equipment. Beside the basic attributes, the equipments have the following additional parameters (the code of the parameter name is given in parenthesis; see Subsection 7.5.6 on Parameters of non-SNMP data collectors):

IP address (SAA EQ 1 IP): Single line text field, which cannot be seen by non-administrators. It contains the IP address of the equipment, similarly to normal SNMP equipment
Community (SAA EQ 2 COMM): Single line text field, which cannot be seen by non-administrators. The field contains the password of the equipment community, similarly to SNMP equipment, if it is not specified, then it is interpreted as public
SNMP version (SAA EQ 3 SNMP): A drop down field, which cannot be seen by non-administrators. The field contains the version of the SNMP used for the query
RTR configuration in the router (SAA EQ 4 CONFIG): Checkbox field, which cannot be seen by non-administrators. If selected, then the PVSR performs the required SAA configurations and then saves the configuration into the persistent memory of the router
User (SAA EQ 5 USER), Password (SAA EQ 6 PASSWORD) and ENA password (SAA EQ 7 ENA PASSWORD): PVSR only uses these parameters if the user configures Path Jitter measurements, because their values cannot be queried using SNMP. If this is the case then PVSR uses telnet protocol to log in into the equipment with the given user name and password and then switches to ena mode with the ENA password. If the user immediately gets into ena mode then the ENA password is not required

Since the measurement server can function in non-discovery mode too, it is possible to create the measurements through the user interface individually. In this case, the Index parameter has to be an integer number, and the PVSR creates the SAA measurement with this number in the equipment. The measurement server is able to perform several kinds of measurements and for almost all measurements different parameters must/can be specified. The parameters and the measurements based on them are as the following. Each parameter can be seen only by the administrators. The PVSR does not validate the values given in the parameters, but the router does, thus the configuration is not successful if the parameter values are not valid. For example, if the sample parameter for the HTTP measurement is 10 seconds, then the router signals an error, while for an ICMP echo measurement it is accepted if the timeout value is not larger than 10000 milliseconds.

ICMP echo measurements: It sends a Ping request to the IP address and it measures the successfulness and the response time, the latter one in milliseconds.

Target address: Single line mandatory text field which contains the IP address to be pinged
Sampling (sec): At what time interval (in seconds) should the router send a ping. It is a mandatory number field, its default value is 10
Timeout (msec): The allowed timeout of the ping in milliseconds. It is an optional parameter, its default value is 10000
Size (byte): The size of the packet to be sent. It is a mandatory parameter, its default value is 28
Source address: From which IP address the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
VRF name: The VFR name of the transmitted request. It is an optional parameter, it is not used by default.

UDP echo measurements: It sends an UDP request to an IP address, and measures its successfulness and the response time, the latter one in milliseconds. For successfulness it is important that there is a target on the other side which replies to the request of the UDP echo. This can be even another router, so in this case the PVSR tries to set the RTR responder on the target address with the help of the just configured parameters if the checkbox of the Control packets is turned on

Target address: Single line text field which contains the target IP address of the request
Target port: Number field which contains the target port of the request. It is a mandatory parameter, its default value is 7, the UDP echo port
Sampling (sec): In how many seconds should the router send a request. It is a mandatory number field, its default value is 10
Timeout (msec): The allowed timeout of the ping in milliseconds. It is an optional parameter, its default value is 10000
Size (byte): The size of the packet it should send. It is a mandatory parameter, its default value is 16
Source address: From which IP address the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
Source port: From which port the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
Control packets: Checkbox field, if it is turned on, then for a successful measurement the target system should return the sent data (just like the UDP echo service does)
VRF name: The VFR name of the transmitted request. It is an optional parameter, it is not used by default.

TCP connect measurements: sends a TCP request to an IP address, and measures its success and the timeout in milliseconds. For success it is important that there exists a target address/port on the other side towards which a TCP connection can be established, and if the Control packets checkbox is turned on, then there should be a service on the other side which responds to the TCP echo request. This can be even another router, so in this case the PVSR tries to set the RTR responder on the target address with the help of SNMP parameters of the just configured equipment if the checkbox of the Control packets is turned on

Target address: Single line text field which contains the target IP address of the request
Target port: Number field which contains the target port of the request. It is a mandatory parameter, its default value is 7, the TCP echo port
Sampling (sec): In how many seconds should the router send a request. It is a mandatory number field, its default value is 60
Timeout (msec): The allowed timeout of the ping in milliseconds. It is an optional parameter, its default value is 5000
Source address: From which IP address the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
Source port: From which port the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
Control packets: Checkbox field, if it is turned on, then for a successful measurement the target system should return the sent data (just like the TCP echo service does)

DNS measurement: sends a DNS request to an IP address, and measures its success and the timeout in milliseconds.

DNS server address: Single line text field which contains the address of the DNS server to be queried
IP address or name to be requested: It contains the IP address or FQDN. It is a mandatory parameter
Sampling (sec): In how many seconds should the router send a request. It is a mandatory number field, its default value is 60
Timeout (msec): The allowed timeout of the request in milliseconds. It is an optional parameter, its default value is 5000
Source address: From which IP address the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
Source port: From which port the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default

FTP measurements: It executes an FTP file download command from the URL and measures its success and time in milliseconds

URL: Single line mandatory text field which contains the URL of the file to be downloaded
Sampling (sec): In how many seconds should the router send a request. It is a mandatory number field, its default value is 60
Timeout (msec): The allowed timeout of the request in milliseconds. It is an optional parameter, its default value is 15000
Passive mode: Checkbox parameter, if it is selected, then the router uses a passive FTP download
Source address: From which IP address the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default

DHCP measurement: sends a DHCP request to an IP address, and measures its success and the timeout in milliseconds.

DHCP server address: Single line text field which contains the DHCP server address to be queried
Sampling (sec): In how many seconds should the router send a request. It is a mandatory number field, its default value is 60
Timeout (msec): The allowed timeout of the request in milliseconds. It is an optional parameter, its default value is 5000
Source address: From which IP address the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default

HTTP measurements: It executes a HTTP file download command from the URL and measures its success and the following times in milliseconds: complete operation time, DNS resolution time, TCP connection time, HTTP service time

URL: Single line mandatory text field which contains the URL to be downloaded
Sampling (sec): In how many seconds should the router send a request. It is a mandatory number field, its default value is 60
Timeout (msec): The allowed timeout of the request in milliseconds. It is an optional parameter, its default value is 15000
Proxy URL: It is an optional text field which contains the optional proxy URL
DNS server address: It is an optional text field, if it is not filled out, then the router uses its own DNS server
Source address: From which IP address the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
Source port: From which port the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
Cache pages download: Checkbox field

Jitter measurements : It sends UDP packets in a defined way towards the IP address and measures the lost packets in both directions, the average response time, and the maximum and average of the positive and negative jitter values also in both directions. The default value of the measurement parameters simulates a G.711 voice call. For the success it is important that there is a target on the other side which replies to the UDP packets. This can be even another router, so in this case the PVSR tries to set the RTR responder on the target address with the help of SNMP parameters of the just configured equipment if the checkbox of the Control packets is turned on

Target address: Single line mandatory text field which contains the target IP address of the query
Target port: Number field which contains the target port of the request. It is a mandatory parameter, its default value is 14384
Packet size (byte): The size of the packet it should send. It is a mandatory parameter, its default value is 172
Number of packets: The number of packages it should send in a measurement cycle. It is a mandatory parameter, it default value is 3000
Packet interval (msec): The time interval in milliseconds it should wait between sending two packets. It is a mandatory parameter, its default value is 20
Frequency (sec): In how many seconds should the router send a request. It is a mandatory number field, its default value is 60
Timeout (msec): The allowed timeout of a packet in milliseconds. It is an optional parameter, its default value is 5000
Source address: From which IP address the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
Source port: From which port the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
Control packets: Checkbox field which should be turned on for jitter measurements
VRF name: The VFR name of the transmitted request. It is an optional parameter, it is not used by default

Path Jitter measurements: the Path Jitter measurement allows the monitoring of jitter values along the route to the given address using ICMP (echo) messages and also the monitoring of the used route to that address. It is important to note that these measurements require command line access to the Cisco device

Path 1, Path 2 and Path 3: Each parameter can contain a different route to the target address: IP addresses separated by the , character. If the route to the target is exactly as specified in Path 1 then the value of the Path measurement will be 1, if it is exactly as specified in Path 2 then the value will be 2, … It is important to note the regardless whether the actual route matches any path, the hop-by-hop measurements will have values if the last route contained that many hops
Target address: Single line mandatory text field which contains the target IP address of the query
Packet size (byte): The size of the packet it should send. It is a mandatory parameter, its default value is 28
Number of packets: The number of packages it should send in a measurement cycle. It is a mandatory parameter, it default value is 10
Packet interval (msec): The time interval in milliseconds it should wait between sending two packets. It is a mandatory parameter, its default value is 20
Frequency (sec): In how many seconds should the router send a request. It is a mandatory number field, its default value is 60
Timeout (msec): The allowed timeout of a packet in milliseconds. It is an optional parameter, its default value is 5000
Source address: From which IP address the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
Target Only: If set then the device only sends messages to the target, i.e. it bypasses the hop-by-hop measurements
VRF name: The VFR name of the transmitted request. It is an optional parameter, it is not used by default

Path Echo measurements: the Path Echo measurement allows the monitoring of availability and round-trip-time values along the route to the given address using ICMP (echo) messages and also the monitoring of the used route to that address

Path: The parameter can contain a route to the target address: IP addresses separated by the , character. If the route to the target is exactly as specified in this parameter then the value of the Path measurement will be 1, otherwise 0. It is important to note the regardless whether the actual route matches the given path, the hop-by-hop measurements will have values if the last route contained that many hops
Target address: Single line mandatory text field which contains the target IP address of the query
Packet size (byte): The size of the packet it should send. It is a mandatory parameter, its default value is 28
Frequency (sec): In how many seconds should the router send a request. It is a mandatory number field, its default value is 10
Timeout (msec): The allowed timeout of a packet in milliseconds. It is an optional parameter, its default value is 10000
Source address: From which IP address the request should be sent. It is an optional parameter, the router defines it by default
VRF name: The VFR name of the transmitted request. It is an optional parameter, it is not used by default

The data collector checks the returned SNMP variable values and if it determines that the value is not valid then the measurement will not be successful. This scenario might occur if the device gives back a 2^32-1 or 2^31 value for the round trip time variable.

As can be seen above, the Cisco SAA measurement server does not provide UPTIME data.

The collector specific pages mentioned in section 14.1.2 SNMP measurement servers can be also used for these equipments, except the Processes and the Disks pages.