Skip Links

Network World

  • Social Web 
  • Email 
  • Close

(Comma separation for multiple addresses)
Your Message:
Clear Choice Test Client Management
Introduction | Test methodology | Score card | Test archive
Inside this test package
Product-by-product summary

Novell ZENworks hands in a solid client management performance

By Barry Nance, Network World Lab Alliance , Network World , 02/04/2008
  • Share/Email
  • Tweet This
  • Comment
  • Print

Novell's ZENworks 10 Configuration Management is a solid, mature desktop manager with several useful features, including asset inventory, license tracking, configuration management, application deployment and remote control. However, ZENworks lacked management capabilities for virtual machines.

The asset inventory process gathered myriads of detail about our Windows, Mac OS X and Linux clients, and it even collected data from our NetWare, AIX and Solaris servers. ZENworks discovered and inventoried our handheld devices, as well. Novell says its inventory function also supports HP-UX, which we didn't test. ZENworks' discovery and inventory data collection processes performed accurately but slowly in our tests. For other (non-inventory) desktop management tasks, ZENworks supports Windows and Linux clients.

ZENworks' deployment of application software packages, via the ZENworks agent we pushed onto our Windows clients worked well. We were impressed by ZENworks' ability to deploy not only the application but also any other software components the application might depend on (the vendor terms this Application Chaining). For instance, for application packages needing a particular version of the Internet Explorer browser, ZENworks distributed the correct browser version as part of the application deployment. For the other products we tested, we had to include the other software components as part of the application image we wanted to deploy. We could even use ZENworks to convert legacy applications to MSI format for easy deployment via ZENworks. Similarly, ZENworks' patch manager did an excellent job of making sure each of our clients had the appropriate security patches applied. ZENworks accurately and helpfully tracked our software licenses as well as monitored our software utilization but did not offer much more than its competitors on this front.

Novell offers a separate security product, called ZENworks Endpoint Security Management, that the ZENworks desktop management tool can deploy and monitor. Besides thwarting malware, Endpoint Security Management manages client USB ports. However, ZENworks does not integrate with third-party antimalware tools.

ZENworks' remote control feature was a joy to use. It let us hide operations on the remote machine from the machine's user, if we wished, and it gave us a special remote diagnostics mode in which we examined the machine's system information, ran diagnostic programs and edited the machine's registry. For after-hours application deployment, the remote control feature also has remote wake and integrated wake-on-LAN that we used to make our application installations a truly unattended affair.

At our behest, ZENworks installed its Preboot Execution Environment (PXE) on our clients. Via PXE, we set up scripts that automatically saved (or, if we wished, later restored) file-oriented images of each machine's hard drive. We thus ensured that we could always revert a desktop PC to a known-to-be-good working state. The result worked well and saved us from many a (simulated) thumb-fingered user error.

  • Share/Email
  • Tweet This
  • Comment
  • Print

Partner Content

Blue Stripe Software

www.bluestripe.com/

Improving Application Performance Troubleshooting

Diagnosing why an application is slow is hard, at times taking days or weeks to isolate and resolve. This paper explains the challenges involved using current management tools, provides a 'wish list' for application management and analysis, and explains the need for an application system-wide approach that monitors entire applications, not components.

Download Whitepaper

Virtual Vigilance: Managing Application Performance in Virtual Environments

This paper highlights the impact of virtualization on application performance.  "Managing Application Performance in Virtual Environments" states: "Best-in-Class organizations are predominately taking actions around improving visibility across both physical and virtual systems, assessing the business impact of application performance and understanding interdependencies of applications in virtualized environments."

Download Whitepaper

Application Service Requests: The Missing Link for Pragmatic ITSM

Forrester Research analyst Glenn O'Donnell and BlueStripe co-founder Vic Nyman discuss a breakthrough approach to application problem management. Learn the new approach for ITSM problem management, which provides: Rapid isolation of application slow-downs to specific components for quick problem resolution, 24/7 monitoring for proactive notification of potential issues before end users are impacted and much more.

Register for Webcast

Comment
Login
Forgot your account info?
Add comment
Anonymous comments subject to approval. Register here for member benefits.
Have a NetworkWorld account? Log in here. Register now for a free account.

Videos

rssRss Feed