Standardized management protocols have played a major role in the software architecture of telecommunication systems. They provide an interface for remote management applications developed by different vendors. Vendors and standardization committees put great effort and large resources into the development of these protocols.

An information model is an abstract representation of the managed resource. Within the domain of standardized protocols, this model is represented with syntax and semantic rules, providing a set of data structures and operations. Unfortunately, this information model is not available in the initial system development phases, but is the result of an independent standardization committee. This leads to evolving information models that often require major software redesigns.

Designers have a wide choice of protocols, where each has its strengths and weaknesses. This choice often influences the architecture of the system, yielding a tight connection between the representation and the internal structure. Such a connection results in inflexibility, making the system hard to adapt to changing market requirements.

This report describes a framework that clearly separates the external standardized protocols and the internal data representation. The framework also provides an application-programming interface (API) that can either be used on a stand-alone basis as a proprietary management protocol, or as a base on which standardized protocols and information models can be built. The API includes organization, function and information models that use Erlang syntax and semantics. It also covers the communication model, based on Erlang distribution principles.

The report shows that there is a transformation of the API to standardized protocols and information models used today. This mapping is abstracted to include a generalized description on how syntax and semantics can be mapped to the major standardized protocols used by the telecom industry. A special emphasis is placed on SNMP.  Other protocols such as CORBA, CMIP/CMIS and HTTP are superficially examined.