The changing face of Web site management

Web site management isn't just monitoring Web speeds and feeds anymore. As Web sites have grown in size and scope, managing them has evolved into a complex job that entails not only controlling traffic, but also watching access to the site, speeding the delivery of content, tracking the steps that comprise commercial transactions and managing the data behind the site.

To let companies conduct business over the Internet, Web sites have grown from small groups of centralized servers into large numbers of geographically distributed server clusters acting in concert with one another. Managing the complex operations requires a sophisticated set of tools that can monitor traffic, tasks and access; analyze database and transactional data; alert Web site managers of any problems; take protective actions; and report on the overall status of the site.

Vendors are now offering software tools that range in scope from point products that analyze specific aspects of Web site operations to entire suites that offer soup-to-nuts monitoring and alerting. The package you should choose depends on the tasks you are seeking to accomplish.

Usage analysis and reporting

A primary requirement for Web site management is the ability to analyze the data collected from a Web server's log file. The newest tools in this arena provide information on incoming and outgoing traffic through firewalls and include statistics on bandwidth utilization, the protocols being used while data is transferred, and information on individual users, such as a user's path through the site. Among the products in this category are Platform Computing's SiteAssure Suite, Heroix's RoboMon NT and WebTrends' Enterprise Suite.

These tools also monitor and collect data used in Web site transactions, and many monitor database application servers. The tools should be able to monitor a variety of database standards, such as Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) or SQL. Avesta's eWatcher and BMC Software's Patrol for E-business also work with Informix and Sybase data.

Link analysis

Products such as WebTrends' comprehensive Enterprise Suite, Brooklyn North Software's Blueprint, Coast Software's WebMaster and WatchFire's Linkbot Pro contain link analysis tools. The modules report on the integrity of links on a Web site and other quality-related measures, such as pages that take a long time to load. (See review, below.)

When selecting a product of this type, look for the ability to instantly fix any broken link on any page or all pages on which it appears. You may also want advanced features, such as explanations of why a given link is listed as broken or the ability to create custom reports.

Site and content management

After your Web-based application is deployed, you should use a site and content management tool to track and manage Web site activity. Tools such as Computer Associates' MasterIT Enterprise Edition or Platform Computing's SiteAssure Suite can map entire Web sites and show you the properties of each link and helpful URL statistics. If you need to focus on specific components, you can drill down to find the information you need.

Typically, these products also automatically scan and create visual maps of your distributed e-business application's structure, including URLs and their subsequent links. The maps typically include HTML pages, Java applets, Common Gateway Interface scripts, ActiveX components, dynamically created pages and pages encrypted using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL). Microsoft's Site Server Commerce 3.0 and Mercury Interactive's Astra SiteManager 2.0 are among the products that perform these functions.

If doing business on the Web is a requirement for your site, you'll want a tool such as Greyscale Systems' SiteMan Website Management, which can trace and test the integrity and security of all links used in financial transactions, documents or forms on your site.

Reporting options should be a consideration when you're looking at a Web site management tool. Look for the ability to display a browser view of your Web site's summary reports. The ability to generate custom reports and export reports in common file and database formats may also be considerations.

Bandwidth/performance testing

Having a killer Web site is useless if it can't handle the traffic load. You can address that concern through comprehensive application testing with software tools that let you predict system behavior and performance. These tools, such as Mercury Interactive's LoadRunner, exercise your Web-based applications by emulating user traffic. They also measure response time, network delays, and server and application performance.

You'll also want to determine whether business transactions work correctly in different browsers. Will technologies such as Java and ActiveX work well enough to have your business rely on them? Look for software that accurately emulates the behavior of browsers and can test a variety of protocols and technologies, such as HTTP, Post Office Protocol 3, Distributed Component Object Model, Common Object Request Broker Architecture and Lightweight Directory Access Protocol.

You'll also need to know if your applications can scale to handle increased traffic volumes. Performance may be sufficient in your local network environment, but how will users be affected when clients are connecting via slower modems? This new breed of testing tool lets you model scenarios to determine the response time users receive over a 56K bit/sec modem or a T-1 connection.

Security

While many products evaluate the integrity of the security configurations of firewalls and Web servers, network managers with electronic commerce sites will want to select products that provide complete support for SSL and digital certificates on clients and servers. Among these products are BMC's Patrol and Avesta Technology's eWatcher.

Monitoring, alerting and recovery

Alerting and monitoring software lets you keep an eye on Web, proxy and e-mail servers, ODBC databases and routers. Some let you specify recovery actions to take when components fail, such as rebooting a server, running a program or executing a script automatically. Most of these products can deliver alerts in various ways, including via e-mail or pager. Heroix's RoboMon NT offers a comprehensive set of alert capabilities for Web sites running on Windows NT and Unix platforms.

This year's crop of management products is more sophisticated than last year's, and the pace of change for the Web site management market is not going to slow anytime soon. These tools will continue to evolve as the use of new technologies like XML, streaming multimedia and digital certificates become more entwined in corporate and e-commerce Web sites. Today's innovative point products will be rolled into tomorrow's management suites, and new point products will be introduced that monitor the effectiveness of content delivery or caching and load-balancing on the network.

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Contact Senior Editor Deni Connor

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