Intelligent Platform Management Interface

The Intelligent Platform Management Interface (IPMI) is a set of computer interface specifications for an autonomous computer subsystem that provides management and monitoring capabilities independently of the host system's CPU, firmware (BIOS or UEFI) and operating system. IPMI defines a set of interfaces used by system administrators for out-of-band management of computer systems and monitoring of their operation. For example, IPMI provides a way to manage a computer that may be powered off or otherwise unresponsive by using a network connection to the hardware rather than to an operating system or login shell.

The specification is led by Intel and was first published on September 16, 1998. It is supported by more than 200 computer system vendors, such as Cisco, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Intel, NEC Corporation, SuperMicro and Tyan.

Using a standardized interface and protocol allows systems-management software based on IPMI to manage multiple disparate servers. As a message-based, hardware-level interface specification, IPMI operates independently of the operating system (OS) to allow administrators to manage a system remotely in the absence of an operating system or of the system management software. Thus IPMI functions can work in any of three scenarios:

System administrators can use IPMI messaging to monitor platform status (such as system temperatures, voltages, fans, power supplies and chassis intrusion); to query inventory information; to review hardware logs of out-of-range conditions; or to perform recovery procedures such as issuing requests from a remote console through the same connections e.g. system power-down and rebooting, or configuring watchdog timers. The standard also defines an alerting mechanism for the system to send a (SNMP) platform event trap (PET).

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