xref: /freebsd/share/man/man4/ifmib.4 (revision 41466b50c1d5bfd1cf6adaae547a579a75d7c04e)
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28.\" $FreeBSD$
29.\"
30.Dd November 15, 1996
31.Dt IFMIB 4
32.Os
33.Sh NAME
34.Nm ifmib
35.Nd Management Information Base for network interfaces
36.Sh SYNOPSIS
37.In sys/types.h
38.In sys/socket.h
39.In sys/sysctl.h
40.In sys/time.h
41.In net/if.h
42.In net/if_mib.h
43.Sh DESCRIPTION
44The
45.Nm
46facility is an application of the
47.Xr sysctl 3
48interface to provide management information about network interfaces
49to client applications such as
50.Xr netstat 1 ,
51.Xr slstat 8 ,
52and
53.Tn SNMP
54management agents.  This information is structured as a table, where
55each row in the table represents a logical network interface (either a
56hardware device or a software pseudo-device like
57.Xr lo 4 ) .
58There are two columns in the table, each containing a single
59structure: one column contains generic information relevant to all
60interfaces, and the other contains information specific to the
61particular class of interface.  (Generally the latter will implement
62the
63.Tn SNMP
64.Tn MIB
65defined for that particular interface class, if one exists and can be
66implemented in the kernel.)
67.Pp
68The
69.Nm
70facility is accessed via the
71.Dq Li net.link.generic
72branch of the
73.Xr sysctl 3
74MIB.  The manifest constants for each level in the
75.Xr sysctl 3
76.Ar name
77are defined in
78.Aq Pa net/if_mib.h .
79The index of the last row in the table is given by
80.Dq Li net.link.generic.system.ifcount
81(or, using the manifest constants,
82.Dv CTL_NET ,
83.Dv PF_LINK ,
84.Dv NETLINK_GENERIC ,
85.Dv IFMIB_SYSTEM ,
86.Dv IFMIB_IFCOUNT ) .
87A management application searching for a particular interface should
88start with row 1 and continue through the table row-by-row until the
89desired interface is found, or the interface count is reached.
90Note that the table may be sparse, i.e. a given row may not exist,
91indicated by an errno of
92.Er ENOENT .
93Such an error should be ignored, and the next row should be checked.
94.Pp
95The generic interface information, common to all interfaces,
96can be accessed via the following procedure:
97.Bd -literal -offset indent
98int
99get_ifmib_general(int row, struct ifmibdata *ifmd)
100{
101	int name[6];
102
103	name[0] = CTL_NET;
104	name[1] = PF_LINK;
105	name[2] = NETLINK_GENERIC;
106	name[3] = IFMIB_IFDATA;
107	name[4] = row;
108	name[5] = IFDATA_GENERAL;
109
110	return sysctl(name, 6, ifmd, sizeof *ifmd, (void *)0, 0);
111}
112.Ed
113.Pp
114The fields in
115.Li struct ifmibdata
116are as follows:
117.Bl -tag -width "ifmd_snd_drops"
118.It Li ifmd_name
119.Pq Li "char []"
120the name of the interface, including the unit number
121.It Li ifmd_pcount
122.Pq Li int
123the number of promiscuous listeners
124.It Li ifmd_flags
125.Pq Li int
126the interface's flags (defined in
127.Aq Pa net/if.h )
128.It Li ifmd_snd_len
129.Pq Li int
130the current instantaneous length of the send queue
131.It Li ifmd_snd_drops
132.Pq Li int
133the number of packets dropped at this interface because the send queue
134was full
135.It Li ifmd_data
136.Pq Li struct if_data
137more information from a structure defined in
138.Aq Pa net/if.h
139(see
140.Xr if_data 9 )
141.El
142.Pp
143Class-specific information can be retrieved by examining the
144.Dv IFDATA_LINKSPECIFIC
145column instead.  Note that the form and length of the structure will
146depend on the class of interface.  For
147.Dv IFT_ETHER ,
148.Dv IFT_ISO88023 ,
149and
150.Dv IFT_STARLAN
151interfaces, the structure is called
152.Dq Li struct ifmib_iso_8802_3
153(defined in
154.Aq Pa net/if_mib.h ) ,
155and implements a superset of the
156.Tn "RFC 1650"
157MIB for Ethernet-like networks.
158.\" This will eventually be defined in an ethermib(4) page.
159For
160.Dv IFT_SLIP ,
161the structure is a
162.Dq Li struct sl_softc
163.Pq Aq Pa net/if_slvar.h .
164.Sh SEE ALSO
165.Xr sysctl 3 ,
166.Xr intro 4 ,
167.Xr ifnet 9
168.\" .Xr ethermib 4 ,
169.Rs
170.%T "Definitions of Managed Objects for the Ethernet-like Interface Types Using SMIv2"
171.%A F. Kastenholz
172.%D August 1994
173.%O RFC 1650
174.Re
175.Sh BUGS
176Many Ethernet-like interfaces do not yet support the Ethernet MIB;
177the interfaces known to support it include
178.Xr ed 4
179and
180.Xr de 4 .
181Regardless, all interfaces automatically support the generic MIB.
182.Sh HISTORY
183The
184.Nm
185interface first appeared in
186.Fx 2.2 .
187