Network management station

In terms of the network management model, a network management station (NMS) is one that executes network management applications (NMAs) that monitor and control network elements (NE) such as hosts, gateways and terminal servers. These network elements use a management agent (MA) to perform the network management functions requested by the network management stations. The Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is used to communicate management information between the network management stations and the agents in the network elements. NMS is described in RFC 1157 "A Simple Network Management Protocol".