Before initiating any management activity through the DMI, a management application must register with the service layer. The registration process enables the service layer to provide services for the management application, such as forwarding indications from components in the system.

The following registration commands are described in the command blocks chapter, according to their command block structure:

• DmiRegisterMgmtReq (DmiRegisterMgmtReq Command Block)
  
• DmiRegisterCnf (DmiRegisterCnf Command Block)

Because the service layer maintains the entry points for a management application until the application unregisters, the application cannot provide different entry points for different commands. However, if for some reason a management application needs to use multiple entry points to the service layer, the application can do one of the following:

• Register a dispatch routine as its entry point and then manually dispatch reports to the appropriate code.

• Register with the service layer more than once, giving different entry points for each registration. For each registration, the service layer assigns a new management handle, so the appropriate handle can be used when issuing a command. Because each registration adds processing overhead to the service layer, this approach should be used only when the first method is not practical.

In addition to the management application's entry points, the service layer must keep the value of the osLanguage string in the command block. This value identifies the language and character set that the service layer uses when sending indications to the management application.