Ontology mapping for network management systems

The existence of various network equipment vendors, such as Cisco and Nortel, introduces an additional layer of complexity to the problem of integrating heterogeneous management information models that are applied in different network domains. The problem of using a mixture of different protocols, such as SNMP (simple network management protocol) and CMIP (common management information protocol), has already been attempted and solved by previous research, New interoperability issues can arise within a single domain when network specialists are required to manage network equipments using different sets of terminologies and via different interfaces. The objective of the paper is to address ontological issues that may arise in an integrated network management application. Ontology is applied first to model the semantics of vendor specific terms, and secondly, to aid in automating the mapping between the terms, in order to create a unified application information base such that management of various brands of network equipments can be performed through a single gateway.