The FDDI Ring Manager for the HP Network Advisor protocol analyzer

Hewlett-Packard Journal, Oct, 1994 by Sunil Bhat, Robert H. Kroboth, Anne L. Driesbach

High-Level Architecture

A quick overview of the architecture of the FDDI version of the HP Network Advisor protocol analyzer will provide a context for a discussion of the architecture of the FDDI Ring Manager. The software architecture of the FDDI Network Advisor consists of three major subsystems. Each subsystem operates on a separate hardware unit with its own processor as shown in Fig. 7. Each subsystem constitutes a multiprocess environment that supports the execution of multiple software modules. The environments are (1) general-purpose, (2) analysis and real-time, and (3) station management.

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The general-purpose environment is responsible for a Smalltalk-based windows graphical user interface and related user interface activities. It maintains and manages persistent information such as node lists and setup configuration. The general-purpose environment communicates with the analysis and real-time and station management environments using commands sent via the interenvironment process communication (IEPC) channel.

The analysis and real-time environment is an event-based nonpreemptive system optimized for network protocol analysis and troubleshooting. It responds to commands from the general-purpose environment and sends back the results of its analysis in specially packaged units called analysis data units (ADUs).

The station management environment is unique to the FDDI version of the Network Advisor protocol analyzer. Its primary function is to run the station management (SMT) process required by the FDDI standard for all stations on the ring. The implementation of the station management process was acquired from Distributed Systems, Inc. The analysis and real-time environment and the station management environment communicate via the station management interface. The FDDI Ring Manager software spans all of the above environments. It consists of software modules in the general-purpose environment that implement the user interface, and in the analysis and real-time environment that provide the basic analysis engine. The analysis engine uses ring information from the station management environment as maintained by the station management process. The data flow diagram for the entire application is shown in Fig. 8. A discussion of the FDDI Ring Manager software modules in the general-purpose environment and the analysis and real-time environment follows.

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General-Purpose Environment GUI Subsystem

The FDDI Ring Manager graphical user interface (GUI) subsystem is an object-oriented system written in Smalltalk. This system heavily leverages the existing HP Network Advisor software platform to provide the user interface functionality for the FDDI Ring Manager. The FDDI Ring Manager user interface subsystem is designed to process various FDDI Ring Manager analysis data units (ADUs) sent from the analysis and real-time environment and display these events appropriately. In addition, control and user commands are processed by the user interface subsystem, and if needed, they are sent to the analysis and real-time system. Fig. 8 shows the data flow diagram for the user interface subsystem.