RFC 1856 (rfc1856) - Page 3 of 17

The Opstat Client-Server Model for Statistics Retrieval

RFC 1856               Opstat Client-Server Model           October 1995


2.2  The Server

   The basic function of the server is to accept connections from a
   client, accept some series of commands from the client and perform a
   series of actions based on the commands, and then close the
   connection to the client.

   The server must have some type of configuration file, which is left
   undefined in this document.  The configuration file would list users
   that could access the server along with the authentication they would
   use.  The configuration file should also allow the specification of
   the data items that the user should be permitted to access (and, by
   implication, not allowed to access).  Server security concerns are
   specifically addressed in Section 4.

3.0  Protocol Commands

   This section defines the commands which may be transmitted to the
   server and the server responses to those commands.  The available
   commands are:

    LOGIN  - accept new connection
    EXIT   - disconnect
    LIST   - show available variables
    SELECT - mark data for retrieval
    STATUS - show the state of the server
    GET    - download data to the client

   In addition, a state machine describing specific actions by the
   server is included.  Server security concerns are addressed in
   Section 4.

   Note that in some of the descriptions below, the term 
   is used.  This refers to printable ASCII characters, defined as all
   letters, numbers, and special characters such as $, %, or *.  It
   specifically excludes all special control characters in the lower
   parts of the character set (i.e., 0x00 - 0x1F), and any such
   characters that are received by the server or client should be
   ignored.












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