Abstract: Storage Area Network (storage area network) management employs agents, each under the control of a common server. Determination and assignment of available agents to candidate manageable entities suffers from several deficiencies. Distributed access control information may be security sensitive. Distribution of the access data across the local storage at the manageable entities is cumbersome to track and manage. Embodiments of the invention provide assignment of agents to manageable entities from a central repository, therefore avoiding distributed sensitive information. Depending upon the type of managed entity the agent is adapted to manage, the server retrieves access data from the repository, rather than from a local initialization (.ini) file. Each agent determines which storage elements it can manage. The server correlates the information sent by each agent for each configured managed entity to generate a management correlation.

Abstract: Mechanisms and techniques for processing information in a network management application, such as a storage area network management application, include an agent and store process. The agent collects a current management data set from managed entity(s) in a network and compares the current management data set to a former management data set previously collected from the managed entity to identify differences in the current management data set as compared to the former management data set. The agent transmits the current management data set to a store process. The store process receives the current management data set and uses verification values and change indicators contained therein to identifying current portions of management data in the current management data that reflect a change. For any changed data portions, the store process modifies or updates managed object data in the management database.