Detection and reduction of excessive SNMP traffic

1. A method comprising:

receiving, over a network from network entities, and storing, on a data storage device, messages each identifying a source network entity and including data representative of a violation or error on the respective source network entity;

tracking responsive actions taken in response to each received message and storing a representation of the responsive actions in association with a respective violation or error;

executing an instruction set on a computer processor to generate a report of messages received from the network entities, the report of messages including a count of violations or errors represented in the messages received from the network entities where the only responsive action taken in response to particular violations or errors has been to ignore the particular violations or errors;

providing a configuration message generation user interface to receive input for generation of at least one configuration message to modify how a particular network entity violation or error is processed; and

generating and sending, in response to input received into the configuration message generation user interface, a configuration message to at least one target, the configuration message executable on a processor of the target to modify how a particular violation or error is processed by the at least one target.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein a source network entity from which a message is received is a device or processes enabled to communicate over the network according to a network management protocol.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one target includes a network management system.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein:

the at least one target is a Simple Network Management Protocol client process executing on a network device; and

the generating and sending the configuration message to the at least one target to modify how a particular violation or error is processed by the at least one target includes generating a Simple Network Management Protocol message instructing the Simple Network Management Protocol client process executing on a network device to no longer send messages with regard to the particular violation or error.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one target includes a network entity.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the network entity includes a network device.

7. A computer-readable storage medium, with instructions stored thereon, which when executed by at least one processor of a computer, cause the computer to:

generate a listing of message types received from at least one network entity, the listing of messages including a listing of violations or errors represented in the received messages for which in response within a network management system, an action taken has been to ignore the violations or error;

provide a network entity user interface to receive input to modify a configuration of at least one of the at least one network entity and the network management system to process a network entity violation or error selected from the list of message types; and

generate and send, in response to input received into the network entity user interface, a configuration message to a target recipient to modify a configuration of how a particular violation or error is processed by the target recipient, the target recipient including at least one of the at least one network entity or the network management system, wherein generating and sending the configuration message to a target recipient includes:

retrieving instructions for a manual process to effect the configuration modification; and

sending the instructions via an electronic messaging system to an administrator.

8. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 7 , wherein the at least one network entity includes a Simple Network Management Protocol client process.

9. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 8 , wherein the Simple Network Management Protocol client process is executed on a network device.

10. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 9 , wherein the network device is a switch.

11. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 7 , wherein the instructions to effect the configuration modification include instructions to modify a configuration of the network management system to ignore additional messages from network entities including a representation of the particular violation or error.

12. A system comprising;

at least one processor;

a memory device;

a network interface device; and

a network management system held in the memory device and executable on the at least one processor to:

generate and display a listing of message types received from at least one network entity via the network interface device, the listing of messages including a listing of violations or errors represented in the received messages for which, in response, within the network management system, an action taken has been to ignore the violations or errors;

provide a network entity user interface on the display device to receive selection input via an input device of the system, the input received to modify a configuration of at least one of the network entities and the network management system to process a network entity violation or error selected from the list of message types; and

generate and send, in response to the received selection input into the network entity user interface, a configuration message to a target recipient to modify a configuration of how the particular violation or error is processed by the target recipient, the target recipient including at least one of the network entities or the network management system, wherein generating and sending the configuration message to a target recipient includes:

retrieving instructions for a manual process to effect the configuration modification; and

sending the instructions via an electronic messaging system to an administrator.

13. The system of claim 12 , wherein the at least one network entity includes a Simple Network Management Protocol client process.

14. The system of claim 13 , wherein the Simple Network Management Protocol client process is executes on a network device.

15. The system of claim 14 , wherein the network device is a router.

16. The system of claim 12 , wherein the instructions to effect the configuration modification include instructions to modify a configuration of the network management system to ignore additional messages from network entities including a representation of the particular violation or error.