6.1 Agent-Specific Errors

If <service_error> is NETMGT_WARNING or NETMGT_FATAL, the agent has come across an agent-specific condition it has previously anticipated. The agent-specific error is given in <agent_error>. The value contained in <agent_error> corresponds to an error/text pair in the agent's schema file, in the agentErrors record. The third field in the error buffer is the <error_message> for specific information about where the error occurred, like the name of an interface.

You should look up the text string corresponding to the error code in the agentErrors agent schema record and present it to the user with the specific error given in <error_message>. (The agent sends back a number rather than a string so the corresponding string can be edited by the local user -- for example, to change it to a different language.)

6.2 Generic Errors

A <service_error> larger than NETMGT_FATAL--a "generic" error code--is defined in netmgt_errno.h. An error like NETMGT_RPCTIMEDOUT indicates an error while contacting the agent. If you got this error while sending a request, you may wish to try and re-send the request. Otherwise, you can call netmgt_sperror(3n) to get the error message associated with <service_error>. Sometimes <error_message> contains additional information about the error.

6.3 Sample Code

The following code fragment is an example of how to handle errors. Note that the routine retry_request referenced in the example is a routine that you would write that retries the request.

Netmgt_error errbuf; char agentMsg[NETMGT_NAMESIZ]; /* agent message */ (void) netmgt_fetch_error(&errbuf); /* get error info */ if ((int)errbuf.service_error > (int)NETMGT_FATAL) { /* generic error */ if ((int)errbuf.service_error == (int)NETMGT_RPCTIMEDOUT) retry_request(); /* retry request */ else fprintf(stderr, "Generic error: %s, %s\n", netmgt_sperror(), errbufmessage); } else { /* agent error */ /* get error message from agent schema */ get_agentError(errbuf.agent_error, agentMsg); fprintf(stderr, "Agent %s: %s, %s\n", /* print message */ (errbuf.service_error == NETMGT_FATAL) ? "error" : "warning", agentMsg, errbuf.message); } return errbuf.service_error;