[e2e] MIB variables vs. ?

[David P. Reed]

The standard flexible and elegant alternative to complex data structures 
(such as MIBs) is a "message-based protocol" that talks to objects that 
can be migrated across the network by copying the object (code & data 
together) or accessed across the network by moving the message to the data.

One can model such a thing after the core Smalltalk VM, or the Self VM, 
for example.   Unlike data structures, objects are inherently 
abstraction-building tools.

Of course you could just put the data structures into ASCII rather than 
ASN.1, and then have the worst of all worlds by using XML to represent 
your MIB equivalent.