This object is used to provide access characteristics pertaining to other objects in the given entity row. The characteristics are divided into categories. Each category uses a set of predefined bits to encode data. The following categories are currently supported: Category Bits Community Access Rights 1..4 Network Interface 5..6 UNUSED 7..15 The categories are orthogonal to each other, so it is not necessary to perform 'inter-category' bounds checking. The object value is a concatentation of encodings from each category, and can be considered a sum. The actual encoding mechanism is defined on a per category basis. Categories ========== Community Access Rights Community access rights are associated with the community name, internet address pair. More than one access right can be defined for a given community name, internet address pair. The encoding works as follows: Starting from zero, for each access right supported, 2 raised to a power is added to the sum. The powers are according to the following table: Type Power readOnly 0 readWrite 1 trap 2 other 3 For example, a community name, internet address pair with readOnly and readWrite access rights, would have a value of 3 (2^0 + 2^1). An access right of other(3) defines the entity row as non-SNMP manageable. Management information is provided in the chasEntityAccessMethod and the Network Interface (defined below). Note: Just because a user directs a message to the community name, internet address pair does not imply that the user is authorized on that pair. Additional security mechanisms may be employed such that only messages from particular internet addresses are authorized. Network Interface The network interface is associated with the internet address and defines the route for management traffic. A network interface can be one of the following: none(0), obm(1), ibm(2), and port(3). The value is placed in the 2-bits reserved for network interfaces. Note: ibm(2) and port(3) are both in-band management. The difference is ibm(2) is a module wide ip address, and port(3) is associated with a particular port/interface.