SNMP

The simple network management protocol (SNMP) forms part of the internet protocol suite as defined by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). SNMP is used by network management systems to monitor network-attached devices for conditions that warrant administrative attention. It consists of a set of standards for network management, including an Application Layer protocol, a database schema, and a set of data objects.

SNMP exposes management data in the form of variables on the managed systems, which describe the system configuration. These variables can then be queried (and sometimes set) by managing applications.