HP again is beating the network management drum with software updates the company says will unify many facets of management as well as automate problem diagnoses and troubleshooting.

HP next month plans to release a software add-on along with an upgrade to Network Node Manager and a retooled version of Opsware's Network Automation System, now simply called Network Automation at HP. The new software add-on, developed internally at HP, is called NNMi SPI for Performance and targets operations staff.

"The product was developed internally and the goal was to increase productivity of IT operations by integrating and unifying views of fault, availability, performance and configuration management data," says Joe Fox, product marketing manager for Network Management Center at HP Software. The software enables workflows to be shared among the updated NNMi application as well as the retooled Network Automation.

The performance management add-on uses the same polling infrastructure as HP's NNM update and installs to work with the existing product. It also helps reduce the number of tools IT operations has to use to solve problems and do their jobs, HP says.

"NNMi SPI provides contextual-based integration and enables unified workflows across all these metrics, so IT staff operators don't have to bring up multiple tools to solve related problems," says Pete Zwetkof, a product manager with HP.

The add-on is available now, but HP is exposing the new product to customers by shipping a kit of three applications in February. A 30-day evaluation copy of NNMi SPI will ship with standard maintenance upgrades to existing customers of NNMi Version 8.01 -- the original product has some 10,000 customers. The company updated NNMi with integrated Alarmpoint Express notifications that would help IT managers get alerts on pressing issues anywhere. Those existing IT manager customers will also get a 30-day, 25-license evaluation version of Network Automation.

Denise Dubie is senior editor with Network World.