SNMP Counter32 vs. Gauge32

I ran into a problem recently where a manufacturer had built a MIB that contained an OID for 'objects in cache' with syntax Counter32.  However, when polling the value of that OID, it was discovered that the OID didn't behave like a Counter32; it went up and down (Counter32 is supposed to only go up; a lower value than the previous poll indicates a roll-over).  It occurred to me that the manufacturer probably meant to indicate the current number of objects in cache and mistakenly set the syntax to Counter32.  Since the actual number of objects in cache can rise or fall, a Counter32 wouldn't accurately represent this.  Instead, a Counter32 would indicate how many items had been added/removed from the cache since the previous poll (since most NMS systems would take the delta between the previous counter value and the current counter value).  While knowing how many items had been added or removed from the cache since the previous poll might be useful, what is probably more useful would be the total count.  The difference actually has nothing to do with the value returned by the device.  The problem is that since the MIB indicated that the OID is a Counter32, most NMS systems interpret that type of object differently, performing a delta instead of reporting the actual number returned by the device.

The fix for this is to change the way the NMS system interprets the returned value by changing the MIB.  In this case, the syntax needs to be changed from Counter32 to Gauge32.

Here is what the MIB contained originally:

 proxyNumObjects OBJECT-TYPE
  SYNTAX Counter32
  MAX-ACCESS read-only
  STATUS current
  DESCRIPTION
   "The number of objects currently held by the proxy."
 ::= { proxySysPerf 2 }

Here is what the MIB needs to be changed to:

 proxyNumObjects OBJECT-TYPE
  SYNTAX Gauge32
  MAX-ACCESS read-only
  STATUS current
  DESCRIPTION
   "The number of objects currently held by the proxy."
 ::= { proxySysPerf 2 }

Changing this syntax in the MIB and recompiling into the NMS system instructs the NMS to use the raw value returned instead of performing a delta with the previously obtained value.

In NetVoyant, recompiling the newly edited MIB will be sufficient to correct this problem.  However, a restart of the Mibs service is required before the newly compiled syntax gets used.  Since everything depends on the Mibs service, everything will get restarted.