Table of Contents

Message syntax

Every message in a communication stream is constructed according to the following syntax:

[Direction] [PackageName]
[Package content - HEX] [Package content - ASCII]

  • Direction: The transmission direction of the package:

    Symbol Description
    << From DMA to element
    >> From element to DMA

  • PackageName: The name that the protocol developer assigned to the package.

  • Package content - HEX: The actual content of the package in hexadecimal format.

    • All data is arranged in blocks of 5 bytes, so one row contains 20 bytes in total.

    • The first block is a header added by the DMA to conveniently number the rows of 20 bytes.

  • Package content - ASCII: The actual content of the package in ASCII format.

    • Non-printable characters are replace by a dot (”.”).

    • Note that not all protocols use ASCII characters. Therefore, this ASCII representation only makes sense if the protocol uses ASCII characters.

Note
  • If a timeout occurs, e.g. when the element did not send a valid response, the keyword “TIMEOUT” is added to the stream.
  • If you connect to SNMP elements using telnet, Get and Set commands will only be shown in ASCII format.
  • Depending on the logging level of an element, additional information may be displayed in the communication stream (e.g. calculations performed by the protocol using values retrieved from the element).
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