In “Systems Management for the Scalable Enterprise (Part 1)", we discussed how enterprises can move from passive, reactive systems monitoring to more proactive systems management. Now we’ll look at the next level— moving to policy-based management, in which automated IT systems implement your management plan in real-time.

Today, too many IT groups are limiting themselves by using systems management tools that only monitor their IT infrastructure. With emerging industry standards and powerful management applications, IT staff can easily move beyond merely monitoring and start taking advantage of the benefits of proactive, policy-based systems management.

Policy-driven management enables IT groups to plan ahead to address contingencies before they occur, automatically directing servers and applications to execute specific actions when certain events occur or thresholds have been crossed. This is systems management “nirvana,” a state of automated independence in which IT staff is free to focus on supporting the business.

Two Paths to Systems Management “Nirvana”

There are two paths to choose from in making the journey to policy-based management.

Option 1: Use an enterprise management suite that can control systems from a range of vendors. These tools can be a bit complicated to learn and might not be optimal for every task, but they can monitor and manage almost any device, from servers and storage to networks, applications and operating systems.

Option 2: Deploy a mix of tools from the leading vendors of server, storage and networking hardware, as well as from application and operating system vendors like Microsoft and Novell. These tools are usually designed to work on specific products, however, so data centers’ staffs need to be trained to use multiple applications, as well as keep track of them.

Just as open standards for hardware platforms have been introduced and embraced by the marketplace, standards have started to emerge for systems management tools. Vendors and standards groups are working to standardize the instrumentation for hardware monitoring, so the same software that manages operating systems and applications can also manage the hardware platform.

These standards will free IT groups from having to use proprietary tools for managing a given device, operating system or application. As standardized management tools are increasingly able to interoperate among different vendors’ products, the data center will be able to manage systems more efficiently.

For example, today’s management tools can indicate when Exchange is slowing down, but they can’t flag a failed disk. In a policy- and standards-based managed environment, management tools will discover disk failure, move I/O as needed to available resources, dispatch a replacement for the disk, and return operating conditions to expected performance.

Vision for the Future

Dell's vision of the systems management architecture of the future breaks down today's proprietary and monolithic architectures into one that’s layered and based on standards. This approach enables network resources, such as servers and storage systems, equipped with standards-based instrumentation to interface seamlessly with any standards-based management tool or console.

To help move the industry forward, Dell is standardizing the management instrumentation (or agents) on managed nodes like servers, storage, switches, client systems and printers. Standardizing the managed node will allow third-party, standards-based management tools to replace current proprietary vendor tools. In this way, Dell is helping to create the ecosystem that enables true open systems management.

“Dell is taking advantage of open standards to add a new level of functionality to systems management,” says Ed Reynolds, Senior Manager for Dell Systems Management Marketing. “For the first time, IT staff will be able to holistically manage systems from the application to the operating system to the hardware platform.”

Dell's approach to the systems management architecture of the future is to help enable well-defined, widely accepted standards that promote interoperability and flexibility in customer computing environments. In this way, Dell intends to provide true open systems management by galvanizing the industry around a common set of management standards.

Open standards systems management has an exciting and promising future. Policy based management will determine if applications are running according to availability and performance guidelines. If not, the system will find and deploy additional capacity. This capability will enable IT managers to meet their service level commitments precisely, without delivering either insufficient or excess capacity.