Keeping It Straight

I&ve written before about how to manage the blizzard of information being generated by the literally dozens of different security appliances and products being deployed across midsize and enterprise accounts. Unless those alerts and reports can be interpreted in realtime, in context, what good are they? Even small businesses often must rationalize messages from separate firewall and VPN appliances, for example. Certainly, both trends underscore the case for a continued consolidation of security products and the emergence of more integrated offerings that promise to do more than one thing. But that&s not what this column is about.

The fact is, it&s much worse than just filtering through security information.

What about the rest of the devices on the network, such as storage arrays and server blades? For that matter, how do you keep track of the status of various business processes, such as your customers& e-commerce capabilities, if you don&t have some sort of consolidated view?

This reality points to the need for smarter systems and network management tools that provide a complete picture, focusing not just on the state of a given piece of equipment or software application but on the health of processes vital to a company&s existence. Plenty of vendors are working on such things. One example you&ll be hearing more about in coming weeks is Computer Associates International&s Unicenter 11. One key component of the new release is a common data repository so Unicenter can more readily accept information from third-party products. What&s more, there&s a skunkworks project going on within CA&s R&D that is thinking through the security and management implications associated with newfangled, limited footprint “end points”—from smartphones to handheld scanners. Too often, CA executives say, companies roll out such devices without considering access control, change management, configurations and, yes, security. Is the tide about to turn for management tools?

How are you keeping things straight? HEATHER CLANCY, Editor at CRN, welcomes your management tips at [email protected].