1.0 Overview

Novell® Open Enterprise Server (OES) has embraced the open standard strategies of Web-Based Enterprise Management (WBEM) proposed by the Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF). Implementing these strategies can substantially reduce the level of complexity associated with managing disparate systems in your network.

The following information describes a few of the components proposed by the DMTF standards. Understanding what these are and how they relate to each other can help you understand what OpenWBEM is and how you most effectively use it in your network.

Web-Based Enterprise Management (WBEM) is a set of management and Internet standard technologies developed to unify the management of enterprise computing environments. WBEM provides the ability for the industry to deliver a well integrated set of standards-based management tools leveraging the emerging Web technologies. The DMTF has developed a core set of standards that make up WBEM:
- A data model: the Common Information Model (CIM) standard
- An encoding specification: CIM-XML Encoding Specification
- A transport mechanism: CIM Operations over HTTP
The Common Information Model (CIM) is a conceptual information model for describing management that is not bound to a particular implementation. This allows for the interchange of management information between management systems and applications. This can be either agent-to-manager or manager-to-manager communications that provide for distributed system management. There are two parts to CIM: the CIM Specification and the CIM Schema.
The CIM Specification describes the language, naming, and meta schema. The meta schema is a formal definition of the model. It defines the terms used to express the model and their usage and semantics. The elements of the meta schema are Classes, Properties, and Methods. The meta schema also supports Indications and Associations as types of Classes, and References as types of Properties.

The CIM Schema provides the actual model descriptions. The CIM Schema supplies a set of classes with properties and associations that provide a well understood conceptual framework within which it is possible to organize the available information about the managed environment.
The Common Information Model Object Manager (CIMOM) is a CIM object manager or, more specifically, an application that manages objects according to the CIM standard.
CIMOM providers are software that performs specific tasks within the CIMOM that are requested by client applications. Each provider instruments one or more aspects of the CIMOM's schema.

Open Enterprise Server contains the CIMOM from the OpenWBEM project.

Novell LIFE and OpenWBEM packages (on Linux) or the owcimomd (WBEM CIMOM Daemon module and other LIBC modules on NetWare®) include a set of basic Novell providers, including some sample providers, and a base set of accompanying Novell schemas.

As Novell moves forward with OpenWBEM and development of specific providers, it will provide tools that offer the following important features:

Efficient monitoring of network systems
Recording of alterations within existing management configurations
Hardware inventory and asset management

Understanding how the OpenWBEM CIMOM is set up and how to configure it can help you monitor and manage disparate system in your network with more confidence and ease.