Apple Mac OS X Server (Version 10.6 Snow Leopard) - Manual (Page 181)

Chapter 8 Monitoring Your System 181
SNMPv2 is the default access protocol and the default read-only community string is
“public.”
Enabling SNMP reporting
SNMP access isn’t enabled by default on Mac OS X Server. To use SNMP tools to poll
your Mac OS X Server for data, you must configure and then enable the service.
To enable SNMP
1 Open Server Admin.
2 Select a server, click the Settings button in the toolbar, and then click the General tab.
3 Select Network Management Server (SNMP).
4 Click Save.
When SNMP is active, anyone with a route to the SNMP host can collect SNMP data
from it.
5 Configure the basic SNMP parameters from the command line.
The SNMP process will not start until /etc/snmpd.conf is configured for the current site.
To configure, see “Configuring snmpd” on page 181.
Note: The default configuration of snmpd uses privileged port 161. For this reason
and others, it must be executed by root or using setuid. Only use setuid as root if you
understand the ramifications. If you do not, seek assistance or additional information.
Flags available for snmpd will change the uid and gid of the process after it starts.
For more information, see the snmpd man page.
Configuring snmpd
The configuration (.conf) file for snmpd is typically at /etc/snmpd.conf. If you have an
environment variable SNMPCONF, snmpd will read any files named snmpd.conf and
snmpd.local.conf in these directories. The snmpd process can be started with a -c flag
to indicate other conf files. For more information about which conf files can be used,
see the snmpd man page.
Configuration files can be created and installed more elegantly using the included
script /usr/bin/snmpconf. As root, use this script with the -i flag to install the file at
/usr/share/snmp/. Otherwise, the default location for the file to be written is the user’s
home folder (~/). Only root has write permission for /usr/share/snmp/.
Because snmpd reads its configuration files at startup, changes to configuration
files require that the process be stopped and restarted. You can stop snmpd with
ProcessViewer or at the command line (
kill -HUP ).