Unless you lived it, it sounds a lot like a fable. But once upon a time, under IBM's System Network Architecture, IT systems had real end-to-end visibility and traffic control. If you listen to the vendor claims, it would seem as if we've regained that ability in today's IP-based networks.

While application performance management (APM) point products certainly are getting better, the reality is that there is no single end-to-end solution today. Furthermore, there are no products that operate at Layer 7, the application layer. Lack of industry cooperation leaves customers struggling to piece together a comprehensive solution.

Still, there are technologies that bring immediate value and therefore are worth the effort. Here's a sampling of some of the more interesting and effective application management products on the market.

Where to start

The foundation for application performance starts in the data center, where an organization must have a solid application infrastructure. This includes operational and performance management, which can be challenging in a multi-tiered application environment.

There are many point products focused on elements of the application infrastructure, but the requirement today is to manage the multiplexed dependencies between hardware, network, operating systems and applications.

To help customers understand the interdependencies associated with these complex application infrastructures, companies such as Collation and Relicore have introduced products that assist in organizing resources logically in relation to the applications they support.

Taking this to the next level, Vieo addresses information gathering, problem resolution and control of application performance in one appliance. The company collects data on the physical and logical resources needed to develop not only a logical view of resource relationships, but also how various applications consume resources.

Vieo's instrumentation also provides an in-depth view of how the interaction of services within resources enable or impede system vs. element performance. The system also can make real-time adjustments to align resources to meet performance goals based on defined polices.

Click to see: The right tool for the job

The information gap

Many vendors have found that companies don't have the basic information to understand what problem needs to be solved or how to stay in step with the fast-changing dynamics of the network environment.

Many companies obtain broad system information from alternative sources, but then need to analyze it and convert that knowledge into specific configurations for their management tools. control products.To fill the gap, Corvil has a network performance appliance that obtains detailed network flow information and conveys it to users in a context that helps let network managers adjust their control settings. The product's initial focus is on Cisco quality-of-service configurations to help companies analyze their networks, make specific configuration recommendations, then analyze those changes and make further recommendations. The next step would be to automate this process. While many IT groups are quite reluctant to allow unattended or automated configuration changes, the dynamics of system behavior eventually will make this standard operating procedure.