Management Information Base (MIB)

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What Does Management Information Base (MIB) Mean?

A management information base (MIB) is a hierarchical virtual database of network (or other entity) objects describing a device being monitored by a network management system (NMS). An MIB is used by Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) and remote monitoring 1 (RMON1).

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The MIB database of objects is intended to reference a complete collection of management information on an entity, such as a computer network; however, it is often used to refer to a subset of the database and is often called an MIB module.

Techopedia Explains Management Information Base (MIB)

Each MIB is addressed or identified using an object identifier (OID), which is often a device’s setting or status. The OID uniquely identifies a managed object in the MIB hierarchy. Each managed object is made up of one or more variables called object instances. These, too, are identified by OIDs.

To remove ambiguous meanings and repair data defects, MIBs are updated, but these changes must be in conformance with Section 10, or RFC 2578, a specific recommendation for comment.The protocols SNMP and RMON1 both use MIB. SNMP gathers data from a single type of MIB; RMON 1 gathers data from nine additional types of MIBs that provide a richer set of data. But the objects (devices such as routers, switches and hubs) must be designed to use the data.

There are two types of managed objects, scalar objects and tabular objects. These define a single object instance or multiple related object instances grouped in MIB tables, respectively.

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Margaret Rouse
Technology Expert
Margaret Rouse
Technology Expert

Margaret is an award-winning technical writer and teacher known for her ability to explain complex technical subjects to a non-technical business audience. Over the past twenty years, her IT definitions have been published by Que in an encyclopedia of technology terms and cited in articles by the New York Times, Time Magazine, USA Today, ZDNet, PC Magazine, and Discovery Magazine. She joined Techopedia in 2011. Margaret's idea of a fun day is helping IT and business professionals learn to speak each other’s highly specialized languages.