SNMP.CONF(5) Net-SNMP SNMP.CONF(5)
NAME
snmp.conf - configuration files for the Net-SNMP applications
DESCRIPTION
Applications built using the Net-SNMP libraries typically use one or more configuration files to control various aspects of their opera-
tion. These files (snmp.conf and snmp.local.conf) can be located in one of several locations, as described in the snmp_config(5) manual
page.
In particular, /etc/snmp/snmp.conf is a common file, containing the settings shared by all users of the system. ~/.snmp/snmp.conf is a
personal file, with the settings specific to a particular user.
IMPORTANT NOTE
Several of these directives may contain sensitive information (such as pass phrases). Configuration files that include such settings
should only be readable by the user concerned.
As well as application-specific configuration tokens, there are several directives that relate to standard library behaviour, relevant to
most Net-SNMP applications. Many of these correspond to standard command-line options, which are described in the snmpcmd(1) manual page.
These directives can be divided into several distinct groups.
CLIENT BEHAVIOUR
defDomain application domain
The transport domain that should be used for a certain application type unless something else is specified.
defTarget application domain target
The target that should be used for connections to a certain application if the connection should be in a specific domain.
defaultPort PORT
defines the default UDP port that client SNMP applications will attempt to connect to. This can be overridden by explicitly includ-
ing a port number in the AGENT specification. See the snmpcmd(1) manual page for more details.
If not specified, the default value for this token is 161.
defVersion (1|2c|3)
defines the default version of SNMP to use. This can be overridden using the -v option.
defCommunity STRING
defines the default community to use for SNMPv1 and SNMPv2c requests. This can be overridden using the -c option.
alias NAME DEFINITION
Creates an aliased tied to NAME for a given transport definition. The alias can the be referred to using an alias: prefix. Eg, a
line of "alias here udp:127.0.0.1:6161" would allow you to use a destination host of "alias:here" instead of "udp:127.0.0.1:6161".
This becomes more useful with complex transport addresses involving IPv6 addresses, etc.
dumpPacket yes
defines whether to display a hexadecimal dump of the raw SNMP requests sent and received by the application. This is equivalent to
the -d option.
doDebugging (1|0)
turns on debugging for all applications run if set to 1.
debugTokens TOKEN[,TOKEN...]
defines the debugging tokens that should be turned on when doDebugging is set. This is equivalent to the -D option.
16bitIDs yes
restricts requestIDs, etc to 16-bit values.
The SNMP specifications define these ID fields as 32-bit quantities, and the Net-SNMP library typically initialises them to random
values for security. However certain (broken) agents cannot handle ID values greater than 2^16 - this option allows interoperabil-
ity with such agents.
clientaddr [<transport-specifier>:]<transport-address>
specifies the source address to be used by command-line applications when sending SNMP requests. See snmpcmd(1) for more information
about the format of addresses.
This value is also used by snmpd when generating notifications.
clientRecvBuf INTEGER
specifies the desired size of the buffer to be used when receiving responses to SNMP requests. If the OS hard limit is lower than
the clientRecvBuf value, then this will be used instead. Some platforms may decide to increase the size of the buffer actually used
for internal housekeeping.
This directive will be ignored if the platforms does not support setsockopt().
clientSendBuf INTEGER
is similar to clientRecvBuf, but applies to the size of the buffer used when sending SNMP requests.
noRangeCheck yes
disables the validation of varbind values against the MIB definition for the relevant OID. This is equivalent to the -Ir option.
This directive is primarily relevant to the snmpset command, but will also apply to any application that calls snmp_add_var() with a
non-NULL value.
noTokenWarnings
disables warnings about unknown config file tokens.
reverseEncodeBER (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
controls how the encoding of SNMP requests is handled.
The default behaviour is to encode packets starting from the end of the PDU and working backwards. This directive can be used to
disable this behaviour, and build the encoded request in the (more obvious) forward direction.
It should not normally be necessary to change this setting, as the encoding is basically the same in either case - but working back-
wards typically produces a slightly more efficient encoding, and hence a smaller network datagram.
SNMPv3 SETTINGS
defSecurityName STRING
defines the default security name to use for SNMPv3 requests. This can be overridden using the -u option.
defSecurityLevel noAuthNoPriv|authNoPriv|authPriv
defines the default security level to use for SNMPv3 requests. This can be overridden using the -l option.
If not specified, the default value for this token is noAuthNoPriv.
Note: authPriv is only available if the software has been compiled to use the OpenSSL libraries.
defPassphrase STRING
defAuthPassphrase STRING
defPrivPassphrase STRING
define the default authentication and privacy pass phrases to use for SNMPv3 requests. These can be overridden using the -A and -X
options respectively.
The defPassphrase value will be used for the authentication and/or privacy pass phrases if either of the other directives are not
specified.
defAuthType MD5|SHA
defPrivType DES|AES
define the default authentication and privacy protocols to use for SNMPv3 requests. These can be overridden using the -a and -x
options respectively.
If not specified, SNMPv3 requests will default to MD5 authentication and DES encryption.
Note: If the software has not been compiled to use the OpenSSL libraries, then only MD5 authentication is supported. Neither SHA
authentication nor any form of encryption will be available.
defContext STRING
defines the default context to use for SNMPv3 requests. This can be overridden using the -n option.
If not specified, the default value for this token is the default context (i.e. the empty string "").
defSecurityModel STRING
defines the security model to use for SNMPv3 requests. The default value is "usm" which is the only widely used security model for
SNMPv3.
defAuthMasterKey 0xHEXSTRING
defPrivMasterKey 0xHEXSTRING
defAuthLocalizedKey 0xHEXSTRING
defPrivLocalizedKey 0xHEXSTRING
define the (hexadecimal) keys to be used for SNMPv3 secure communications. SNMPv3 keys are frequently derived from a passphrase, as
discussed in the defPassphrase section above. However for improved security a truely random key can be generated and used instead
(which would normally has better entropy than a password unless it is amazingly long). The directives are equivalent to the short-
form command line options -3m, -3M, -3k, and -3K.
Localized keys are master keys which have been converted to a unique key which is only suitable for on particular SNMP engine
(agent). The length of the key needs to be appropriate for the authentication or encryption type being used (auth keys: MD5=16
bytes, SHA1=20 bytes; priv keys: DES=16 bytes (8 bytes of which is used as an IV and not a key), and AES=16 bytes).
sshtosnmpsocketperms PATH
Sets the path of the sshtosnmp socket created by an application (e.g. snmpd) listening for incoming ssh connections through the ssh-
tosnmp unix socket.
sshtosnmpsocketperms MODE [OWNER [GROUP]]
Sets the mode, owner and group of the sshtosnmp socket created by an application (e.g. snmpd) listening for incoming ssh connections
through the sshtosnmp unix socket. The socket needs to be read/write privileged for SSH users that are allowed to connect to the
SNMP service (VACM access still needs to be granted as well, most likely through the TSM security model).
SERVER BEHAVIOUR
persistentDir DIRECTORY
defines the directory where snmpd and snmptrapd store persistent configuration settings.
If not specified, the persistent directory defaults to /var/lib/net-snmp
noPersistentLoad yes
noPersistentSave yes
disable the loading and saving of persistent configuration information.
Note: This will break SNMPv3 operations (and other behaviour that relies on changes persisting across application restart). Use
With Care.
tempFilePattern PATTERN
defines a filename template for creating temporary files, for handling input to and output from external shell commands. Used by
the mkstemp() and mktemp() functions.
If not specified, the default pattern is "/tmp/snmpdXXXXXX".
serverRecvBuf INTEGER
specifies the desired size of the buffer to be used when receiving incoming SNMP requests. If the OS hard limit is lower than the
serverRecvBuf value, then this will be used instead. Some platforms may decide to increase the size of the buffer actually used for
internal housekeeping.
This directive will be ignored if the platforms does not support setsockopt().
serverSendBuf INTEGER
is similar to serverRecvBuf, but applies to the size of the buffer used when sending SNMP responses.
MIB HANDLING
mibdirs DIRLIST
specifies a list of directories to search for MIB files. This operates in the same way as the -M option - see snmpcmd(1) for
details. Note that this value can be overridden by the MIBDIRS environment variable, and the -M option.
mibs MIBLIST
specifies a list of MIB modules (not files) that should be loaded. This operates in the same way as the -m option - see snmpcmd(1)
for details. Note that this list can be overridden by the MIBS environment variable, and the -m option.
mibfile FILE
specifies a (single) MIB file to load, in addition to the list read from the mibs token (or equivalent configuration). Note that
this value can be overridden by the MIBFILES environment variable.
showMibErrors (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
whether to display MIB parsing errors.
commentToEOL (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
whether MIB parsing should be strict about comment termination. Many MIB writers assume that ASN.1 comments extend to the end of
the text line, rather than being terminated by the next "--" token. This token can be used to accept such (strictly incorrect)
MIBs.
Note that this directive was previous (mis-)named strictCommentTerm, but with the reverse behaviour from that implied by the name.
This earlier token is still accepted for backwards compatibility.
mibAllowUnderline (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
whether to allow underline characters in MIB object names and enumeration values. This token can be used to accept such (strictly
incorrect) MIBs.
mibWarningLevel INTEGER
the minimum warning level of the warnings printed by the MIB parser.
OUTPUT CONFIGURATION
logTimestamp (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Whether the commands should log timestamps with their error/message logging or not. Note that output will not look as pretty with
timestamps if the source code that is doing the logging does incremental logging of messages that are not line buffered before being
passed to the logging routines. This option is only used when file logging is active.
printNumericEnums (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Equivalent to -Oe.
printNumericOids (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Equivalent to -On.
dontBreakdownOids (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Equivalent to -Ob.
escapeQuotes (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Equivalent to -OE.
quickPrinting (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Equivalent to -Oq.
printValueOnly (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Equivalent to -Ov.
dontPrintUnits (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Equivalent to -OU.
numericTimeticks (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Equivalent to -Ot.
printHexText (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Equivalent to -OT.
hexOutputLength integer
Specifies where to break up the output of hexadecimal strings. Set to 0 to disable line breaks. Defaults to 16.
suffixPrinting (0|1|2)
The value 1 is equivalent to -Os and the value 2 is equivalent to -OS.
oidOutputFormat (1|2|3|4|5|6)
Maps -O options as follow: -Os=1, -OS=2, -Of=3, -On=4, -Ou=5. The value 6 has no matching -O option. It suppresses output.
extendedIndex (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Equivalent to -OX.
noDisplayHint (1|yes|true|0|no|false)
Disables the use of DISPLAY-HINT information when parsing indices and values to set. Equivalent to -Ih.
FILES
/etc/snmp/snmp.conf, /etc/snmp/snmp.local.conf - common configuration settings
~/.snmp/snmp.conf - user-specific configuration settings
SEE ALSO
snmp_config(5), read_config(3), snmpcmd(1).
4th Berkeley Distribution 29 Jun 2005 SNMP.CONF(5)