Cisco Networking Services 1.0 delivers on the promise of the DMTF Directory Enabled Networks (DEN) standard. CNS provides common infrastructure and connective tissue to enable Cisco products to work together and to empower Cisco customers to deploy custom directory-enabled solutions.

Traditional management solutions manage network components and services individually with little or no interoperability or data sharing. But customers want smart networks. Each customer network must function as a system and be managed as a single entity. This is the problem the DEN standard addresses by specifying a standard, extensible data model (DMTF's CIM standard) with LDAP mappings to enable data sharing and coordination of management tasks. CNS 1.0 delivers the base set of components required to implement DEN--the standard CIM schema with Cisco extensions.

But CNS is more than a CIM/DEN-based data model. It provides the robust, scalable infrastructure elements needed to enable seamless, end-to-end management of customer networks.