FAQ on app performance management

When it comes to app performance, a number of vendors claim to measure the only thing that matters: the client's experience.

What vendors provide client-side application performance-management products?

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What vendors provide client-side application performance-management products?

What types of client-side application performance management products are available?

Can the information gathered from these products be integrated into a management platform?

How much do these products cost?

What are the downsides?

What vendors provide client-side application performance-management products?

Citrix Systems (via its Reflectent Software buy), Compuware, Coradiant, NetQoS, PremiTech, ProactiveNet, Symphoniq and TeaLeaf Technology are among vendors offering a user view to application performance management. This is not a comprehensive list.

What types of client-side application performance management products are available?

There are generally three types of products for collecting client-side application performance information:  

• Management software combined with distributed agents that are deployed on client machines to capture application performance data (Citrix and PremiTech).
• Monitoring software that collects performance metrics across an infrastructure, without requiring agents on every managed client machine (Compuware, ProactiveNet, Symphoniq).
• Appliances, which monitor traffic and capture metrics, such as response time, while users interact with applications (Coradiant, NetQoS and TeaLeaf).

 In addition, synthetic Web-application and site-performance measurement tests from Gomez and Keynote Systems use agents distributed throughout the Internet to determine how a Web site and the applications running on it react to peak loads and various geographies.

Can the information gathered from these products be integrated into a management platform?

The tools typically offer their own management interfaces and reporting features, and many vendors partner with companies such as BMC, CA, HP and IBM to deliver the client perspective to larger management consoles. IT managers also can handle the integration on their own.

How much do these products cost?

Price varies by type of product, number of users being monitored and a range of other factors. For example, Compuware’s ClientVantage software starts at about $31,500, TeaLeaf’s appliance software at  about $80,000 for an average deployment, and Symphoniq’s TrueView software at about $10,000.

What are the downsides?

Products that require agents installed on client machines to capture performance data don’t work for Web-based applications because IT managers can’t install agents on machines outside of their infrastructure. That means Web-based application performance on all clients is not measurable. Additionally, products that passively monitor client and data-center interactions related to Web applications collect  so much data that pinpointing the source of a problem in real time can be difficult. And those techniques that use synthetic testing to determine performance get metrics on a sample of transactions and can’t measure real-world scenarios.

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