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Vacation, change of scenery

July 21, 2006
I will be on vacation until August 7. Upon my return I will encounter a change of scenery here. In the coming days the network...
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Managing your career path

July 18, 2006
Priscilla Milam, featured this week in Network World's Management Strategies section, didn't know networking was her calling from Day One. The current IT executive at...
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Hyperic releases source code to management platform

July 17, 2006
Hyperic, a start-up with an affiliation toward open source, today released the source code for Hyperic HQ, a management software platform the company says can...
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HP says: Manage IT as a service

July 14, 2006
HP's OpenView management software is popular among network managers, but company executives have been working to evolve its software to address more than restoring downed...
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IBM preps SIM software

July 13, 2006
IBM today unveiled software designed to manage security events from disparate network devices. The software is based on technology IBM acquired with Micromuse earlier this...
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Making ITIL work in your network

July 12, 2006
Network managers accustomed to troubleshooting and firefighting network problems in real time may not always follow a pre-defined process to get critical tasks done day-to-day....
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Opsware to add storage management to its data center automation suite.

July 11, 2006
Data center automation vendor Opsware is adding storage to the list of IT domains it can manage. The vendor today announced it had entered into...
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Nagios open source software now covered in Splunk searches

July 10, 2006
Systems management and search start-up Splunk today made available a software add-on that will enable Nagios open source monitoring software users to more quickly pinpoint...
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HP introduces management excellence awards

July 07, 2006
Network and systems management IT projects tend to be massive undertakings that require long-term commitment across several IT departments. This year HP's OpenView management software...
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Dashboards in the right doses

July 06, 2006
A recent study by The Data Warehousing Institute (TDWI) shows that the use of performance dashboards is on the rise, but that IT and business...
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Monitoring IP performance without probes

June 30, 2006
A new draft standard at the IETF might make it possible for network managers to track IP performance between network devices without deploying hardware or...
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Event processing for business metrics

June 29, 2006
The technology that helps network managers collect data from multiple sources such as routers and servers is being put to use in a similar fashion...
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Designing your ideal dashboard

June 27, 2006
IT managers have long been looking at statistics in various consoles, but today the concept of dashboards -- which pull data from many IT and...
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Taking on application optimization

June 26, 2006
There will never be one approach to perfecting application performance across distributed enterprise networks. In fact, there are many methods network managers employ to get...
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Blue Coat adds NetCache to app acceleration product plans

June 23, 2006
Blue Coat Systems, which this year upgraded its security and proxy technology with acceleration features, this week announced it would acquire the NetCache business from...
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Open Management Consortium welcomes new member

June 22, 2006
Hyperic, a maker of an open-source management platform, this week announced it has joined other open source advocates in their efforts to make using open...
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Mainframe management tools alive and well

June 21, 2006
Despite a once widespread belief that distributed systems could entirely displace mainframes in IT shops, companies such as Merrill Lynch refuse to abandon their legacy...
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CA shuffles the management deck again

June 20, 2006
CA today announced it has appointed Alan Nugent, the senior vice president and general manager of the Enterprise Systems Management Business Unit, to the position...
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HP unveils planning tool for IT staff and resource use

June 19, 2006
HP this week at its annual HP Software Forum user conference in Miami will showcase new tools to help IT managers plan for future projects,...
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Tackling the challenge of VoIP management

June 15, 2006
Converged networks are becoming more commonplace, and as the trend to run voice applications over IP networks continues to flourish, the approach to managing performance...
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Managing to the transaction level

June 13, 2006
Application management itself represents a challenge to network managers. Add to that the loosely coupled nature of service-oriented architecture-based (SOA) applications and the management burden...
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Easing management with hardware smarts

June 12, 2006
Deploying network and systems management software is not a quick and easy task, as even most vendors will admit. One of the ways to lessen...
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HP partners with Voyence for network change and configuration product

June 08, 2006
HP this week dabbled in the network configuration management market with a licensing deal to package Voyence's technology as HP OpenView Network Configuration Manager....
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EMC acquires application discovery and mapping partner nLayers

June 07, 2006
Not even a month after EMC announced it had used nLayers technology in its Application Discovery Manager (ADM) appliance, EMC today made public that it...
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Hyperic makes its commercial software open source

June 06, 2006
Hyperic, a start-up that has roots in open source, today decided to make its commercial management software -- Hyperic HQ -- available under an open...
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Appliances to manage and secure your network without IT staff

June 05, 2006
Maintaining remote offices without IT staff on hand can pose many challenges, but vendors such as NetBotz are addressing this issue by selling sensors that...
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CA's accounting woes makes news again

June 02, 2006
CA seemed to be on track to put its scandalous accounting past behind it -- that is until this past week when the software maker...
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Slew of acquisitions shape the infrastructure management market

June 01, 2006
Does it seem like every time you turn around your management software maker has acquired another company or technology?...
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Customer experience management

May 31, 2006
TeaLeaf this week announced it has upgraded its online application management software to better capture the customer experience....
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IBM federates configuration database

May 26, 2006
Following in the footsteps of competitors BMC and HP, IBM this week upgraded its Tivoli Change and Configuration Management Database to now support a federated...
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ArcSight to acquire Enira, converge systems and security management tools

May 25, 2006
Security management vendor ArcSight this week announced it would acquire network management start-up Enira Technologies. The coupling could, in theory, equip enterprise IT customers with...
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Performance monitoring from the end-user perspective

May 24, 2006
Network managers are tasked with a new challenge: perfecting the end-user experience. Because of this, tools to capture what happens on client machines are becoming...
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WildPackets hosts Webinar series

May 22, 2006
Network analysis vendor WildPackets last week launched a series of Webinars the company says will provide attendees with tools to better perform Wi-Fi analysis, VoIP...
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Open source management and SOA

May 19, 2006
This week the OpenNMS Project released results of its participation in a proof-of-concept that demonstrated how open source network management applications could work in conjunction...
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IBM increases automation in systems management tools with technology buy

May 18, 2006
IBM today announced it would acquire a Swiss software maker to fill a gap in its Tivoli systems management product portfolio. Rembo Technology will help...
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Bandwidth management

May 17, 2006
Network managers looking for ways to deliver better application performance to wide-area users probably should take a look at recent developments in bandwidth management....
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Application dependency mapping

May 16, 2006
To really manage performance of network and application environments, industry watchers say, you have to first know what you're dealing with -- meaning you need...
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Open source management and the community behind it

May 15, 2006
Oftentimes when network managers are debating the pros and cons of rolling out open source products enterprisewide, the issues of support and ongoing development stop...
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Citrix acquires Reflectent Software

May 12, 2006
Citrix this week announced it had acquired privately-held Reflectent Software, a software vendor that focuses on application performance management to the desktop....
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Hyperic gets funding for its open management framework

May 11, 2006
Open source seems to be where it's at this week in the network and systems management market. Earlier this week a group of vendors announced...
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Get the skinny on NAC

May 10, 2006
Network access control, or NAC, technologies offer network managers a means to protect their networks from viruses, worms, unwanted guests and potentially compliance violations. But...
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Open source management companies establish industry organization

May 09, 2006
Open source products continue to flourish and the diversity of tools available continues to grow. For instance, last week at Interop, companies such as Vyatta...
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Vendors showcase freeware at Interop

May 04, 2006
It's no secret that Interop attendees are often shopping -- or at the very least browsing -- for new technology to solve an IT problem...
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HP in the rumor mill again; this time for Mercury buy

May 04, 2006
According to one tipster at Interop and a report in an online Israeli publication, HP is in the process of acquiring Mercury Interactive. Both companies...
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Apdex Alliance celebrates its one-year anniversary at Interop

May 03, 2006
Launched at last year's Interop conference, the Apdex Alliance this year continues its work toward developing a standard measurement for application performance from the end-user...
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Splunk partners with CA to deliver more intelligent management data

May 02, 2006
Splunk this week at Interop is set to announce a partnership with CA that industry watchers say can help IT managers more quickly determine the...
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Network management vendors increase application intelligence

April 30, 2006
Network managers have long known they need to keep up with application performance and more vendors are adding application intelligence to their monitoring tools to...
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NetIQ gets picked up by Attachmate

April 28, 2006
Attachmate this week announced its intentions to acquire NetIQ, a maker of systems and security management software....
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Avocent sets its sights on LANDesk Software

April 27, 2006
Avocent, a KVM switch provider and maker of management tools for remote server administration, today announced it would acquire LANDesk Software, which focuses on systems...
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Using management to balance the benefits and risks of desktop search tools

April 26, 2006
Desktop search could be the productivity tool your company needs, but the sometimes-free software applications can also pose a security threat in terms of data...
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Ex CA exec pleads guilty to fraud charges

April 25, 2006
Former CA CEO Sanjay Kumar pleaded guilty yesterday to financial fraud charges in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn, according to reports in The Wall Street...
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Managing multi-platform databases for free

April 24, 2006
CA this week made available for free Unicenter Database Command Center, a scaled down version of its enterprise-class distributed database management product. The offer could...
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CA joins management vendors' CMDB standard efforts

April 20, 2006
On the heels of competitors, CA announced this week the company would join forces with BMC, Fujitsu, HP and IBM to hammer out a standard...
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From patch distribution to security management platforms

April 20, 2006
Remember that classic Reese's commercial? You know the one in which two guys just strolling along bump into each other and one says, "Hey you...
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Making a case for Data Center Intelligence

April 19, 2006
A start-up company says it has the solution to many IT managers' problem: cross-platform automated change and configuration management software for heterogeneous data centers....
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Starting a configuration management database

April 18, 2006
For management vendors, CMDB technology is all the rage right now. If you don't have a product that focuses on this tenet of the IT...
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How dangerous is desktop search to your organization?

April 17, 2006
Many desktop search tools are free to download, which could mean your end-users are currently loading their machines with the software. And without set internal...
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Maturing IP address management practices

April 14, 2006
It's hard to resist freebies, especially when it comes to enterprise management software. But industry watchers and savvy network managers say today's complex networks require...
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CA set to acquire Cybermation

April 13, 2006
CA intends to remain among the top vendors offering mainframe management. The company this week announced it would acquire Cybermation in a $75 million deal...
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Investing in network management

April 13, 2006
Venture capital firms are putting their money on network monitoring and troubleshooting tools in an effort to upset the market leaders -- BMC, CA, HP...
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Management vendors join forces to draft configuration spec

April 11, 2006
BMC, Fujitsu, HP and IBM today announced they would work together toward developing an interoperability specification that would enable customers to share configuration information among...
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Cisco releases application acceleration product

April 10, 2006
Cisco this week upped the ante in the application acceleration market with the release of a new product geared toward consolidating multiple WAN optimization functions...
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A look at bandwidth management

April 07, 2006
Recently in Network World industry analyst Frank Dzubeck looked at a wide array of bandwidth management products and discussed why the technology won't go away...
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Application acceleration market heats up

April 06, 2006
If all the news articles, product announcements and marketing hype around the application acceleration market had you wondering if the market was for real, you...
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Network and systems monitoring start-up gets more funding

April 05, 2006
Cittio -- a management software maker that intends to challenge the likes of BMC, CA, HP and IBM -- recently received more venture capital funding...
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New essentials in network management standards

April 04, 2006
Network managers are more than familiar with Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) and are adept at using command line interfaces (CLI) to get to management...
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Management search software community set to debut at at LinuxWorld

April 03, 2006
This week at the LinuxWorld Boston conference, more than 200 vendors are expected to exhibit and some plan to announce products -- among them a...
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IT spending on the rise

March 31, 2006
Reports show that IT budgets will be growing -- albeit moderately -- in 2006. IDC, SG Cowen and Forrester Research separately reported that spending is...
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AmberPoint lands another $10 million for SOA management and security products

March 30, 2006
AmberPoint, maker of Web services and services-oriented architecture (SOA) management and security products, this week garnered another $10.3 million in venture capital funding, bringing its...
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Business skills in demand within IT workforce

March 29, 2006
A recent study released by the Society of Information Management (SIM) shows that IT jobs continue to be in demand -- but with a twist....
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Go-it-alone management strategies

March 28, 2006
In the wake of BMC's announcement that it would acquire Identify Software, Goldman Sachs distributed a research paper discussing the deal and its potential for...
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BMC makes an application management buy

March 27, 2006
BMC today announced its plans to acquire Identify Software, a vendor whose technology is designed to help companies spot application performance problems down to the...
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Network managers' IT plans for 2006

March 24, 2006
Ever wonder if the IT challenge you're tackling is similar to that of others? Earlier this week at Network World's IT Roadmap conference, I briefly...
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Standards-based management

March 23, 2006
While network managers work to get their multiple management tools integrated, inevitably somewhere within one of several industry standards bodies, there is a team of...
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Technology roadmaps

March 22, 2006
This week Network World hosted the IT Roadmap conference in its hometown of Boston that welcomed some 500 attendees and featured some real world IT...
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Automating change management

March 21, 2006
Enterprise network managers that tackle change management understand how critical it is to incorporate automation technologies into the process....
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Application traffic management

March 19, 2006
Network managers are becoming more and more responsible for application performance all the way down to the end-user desktop, and the new set of responsibilities...
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Wide-area challenges for network managers

March 17, 2006
Network managers encounter new roadblocks when looking to guarantee performance over the WAN. The tips and tricks that may apply to the local area sometimes...
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Network management consolidation: among vendors and within customer nets

March 16, 2006
Over the past few years, major network and systems management vendors have been acquiring niche players to fill out their product suites, and in the...
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Network management case studies

March 15, 2006
Next week at Network World's IT Roadmap Conference in Boston, Jim Mass, network monitoring engineer at Fresenius Medical Care in Lexington, Mass., will share his...
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Prepping for a bird flu pandemic

March 14, 2006
As the world faces the threat of a widespread outbreak of the avian flu, network managers (such as Priceline CIO Ron Rose) scattered throughout the...
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Network managers: From device keepers to customer satisfaction execs

March 13, 2006
Network management technologies have long been able to monitor health and availability of distributed devices. The challenge now, according to a slew of network managers,...
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Harvard IT exec schools us on managing its network

March 10, 2006
Keeping 100 university departments connected requires some savvy management techniques. Harvard University's Jay Tumas, network operations manager, approaches that challenge with a combination of homegrown...
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The value of user groups

March 09, 2006
This week Network World added another resource to this online research center: links to management software user groups....
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ITIL gain steams

March 08, 2006
The Information Technology Infrastructure Library, or ITIL for short, is no longer a new concept among IT managers, but interest in the best practice framework...
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Managing risk with security policies

March 07, 2006
Elemental Security this week updated its flagship policy management software with capabilities the company says will safeguard customers against security breaches as well as prepare...
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Management vendors 'express' themselves

March 03, 2006
IBM recently announced it would be slimming down various applications within its Tivoli management software to offer easy-to-install, operate and maintain products to small and...
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JPMorgan Chase: Automating, virtualizing to handle growth

March 02, 2006
At JPMorgan Chase, the business and technology groups work closely together to ensure their systems can handle the demands of their fast-paced business. The company...
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Talking about application acceleration

March 01, 2006
Speeding application traffic across WAN links is a growing concern for network managers as workforces become more remote and data center consolidation continues to drive...
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HP OpenView takes the prize

February 28, 2006
HP, which has historically gotten a lot of heat for not better incorporating its management software across product divisions or promoting it as well as...
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Managed services market refresh

February 27, 2006
Despite a changing landscape of vendors in the past 10 years, the demand for outsourced IT management services hasn't gone away. Managed service providers emerged...
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Network World online forum: Application acceleration across the WAN

February 24, 2006
Next week Network World is hosting an online forum (which I am moderating) among application acceleration and WAN optimization vendors....
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ITIL, straight from the change manager's mouth

February 23, 2006
If you've ever wanted a blow-by-blow description of making the best practices of the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) work in an enterprise environment directly...
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JPMorgan Chase tackles data center automation

February 22, 2006
Financial services firms tend to be on the bleeding edge of new technologies, considering the hectic pace their IT systems must maintain to keep up...
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CA management executive takes the "Hot Seat"

February 21, 2006
In a Network World video interview, CA's Alan Nugent, senior vice president and general manager of the software company's Unicenter line, took the "Hot Seat"...
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IBM Tivoli works on security flaw

February 17, 2006
IBM said this week it is working to address a security vulnerability discovered in its Tivoli Directory Server software....
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Moss settles in at MIT

February 16, 2006
What do you do after you've led one of the most successful management software start-ups in technology history and changed the way IBM did management?...
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Got a funny or strange end-user request story to share?

February 15, 2006
This week in Network World Senior Editor Jennifer Mears and I shared stories we gathered from network managers about strange, weird or simply silly end...
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Cisco and Opsware: Partners in data center automation

February 14, 2006
Opsware this week announced it has entered into a partnership with Cisco that would have Opsware's Network Automation System distributed under the Cisco brand and...
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Coupling management and security

February 13, 2006
This week's RSA Conference is attracting all types of vendors, many promising that their technology can deliver an extra layer of security to enterprise networks....
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Management vendors refresh ID software

February 10, 2006
Identity management technology didn't get its start under the direction of the big four management software makers, but BMC, CA, HP and IBM are certainly...
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Demonstrating superior desktop support

February 09, 2006
This week's Demo 2006 conference in Phoenix is highlighting the latest in technologies from security vendors such as StrikeForce Technology to innovations in speedy food...
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Symantec set to acquire Relicore

February 08, 2006
Symantec continues to expand its horizons. This week the vendor delves into the realm of automated data center change and configuration management with its announced...
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Network behavior monitoring as security measure

February 07, 2006
With next week's RSA Conference in San Jose, the talk among several management vendors has turned to security....
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Network General acquires Fidelia

February 06, 2006
Network General, maker of the Sniffer brand of network packet analysis tools, today announced it has acquired Fidelia, maker of NetVigil software for monitoring infrastructure...
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Gauging IT governance

February 03, 2006
With all the talk of best practices, more companies are taking the time to measure their process maturity....
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Management acronym soup

February 02, 2006
Not sure if you should roll out APM, BSM, ITSM or SLM?...
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Mastering ITIL processes

February 01, 2006
As interest in and adoption of the ITIL framework peaks, industry watchers advise those bringing the best practices in house to take their time and...
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Web worst-case scenario

January 31, 2006
A recent survey of about 350 IT professionals revealed that 98% learn of Web site performance problems directly from end users. More than 50% of...
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CA stays on integration track

January 30, 2006
Keeping its promises from last year's CA World user conference, CA this week made available two sets of products within its systems and security management...
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Managing desktop security

January 27, 2006
When deciding which devices to let on their networks, a majority of 500 IT managers surveyed admitted they had no set network access control policy....
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SMB management still manual

January 26, 2006
With all the talk of automation technologies, it's sometimes surprising to find many IT shops function by mostly manual means....
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Big Blue's buying binge and network management

January 25, 2006
IBM isn't afraid to spend money, especially when the company wants to take the lead in specific technologies -- such as network management....
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Network managers: Getting to know applications

January 24, 2006
It's not new to network managers that they need to also be on top of application performance, and now that vendors have gotten the hint,...
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On the road with Network World

January 23, 2006
Network management isn’t a new challenge, but emerging applications, security risks and compliance demands could change how you tackle the all-encompassing task of ensuring peak...
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Application management essentials

January 20, 2006
Quest Software released the results of a survey of some 600 IT specialists and found respondents believe application management software should address a broad spectrum...
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WAN management wishlist

January 19, 2006
Recently I wrote a couple of newsletters about an industry analyst's research and perspective on why WAN performance optimization is becoming more critical for enterprise...
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LANDesk buys BPM tools

January 18, 2006
LANDesk Software this week announced it had acquired a privately held business process management (BPM) software maker, which could help LANDesk automate workflows....
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Building bridges between best practice frameworks

January 17, 2006
Instilling best practices across your organization your new year's resolution?...
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CA logs another acquisition

January 13, 2006
CA this week announced it had acquired Control F1, a maker of automated support software for end-user devices. The terms of the deal were undisclosed....
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Bad press for Intelliden chair

January 12, 2006
John Gerdelman, chairman of Intelliden, is getting some unwanted press for nothing having to do with the network configuration management vendor. His name has surfaced...
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Network management essentials

January 11, 2006
In every job, there are must-have tools needed to get the job done. I have an idea of what those might be for network managers,...
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Mercury rising?

January 10, 2006
Mercury Interactive this week announced it would be acquiring Systinet, a maker of service-oriented architecture (SOA) software and services, a hot technology that could catapult...
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What's in your wallet?

January 09, 2006
Salaries for network professionals haven't fluctuated much in the past year, according to a survey recently completed by management consulting firm Janco Associates....
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CA chief gets candid

January 06, 2006
CA President and CEO John Swainson tells it like it is....
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No surprises in CA buy

January 05, 2006
CA today announced it had signed a deal to acquire application management software maker Wily Technology....
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Cisco's net management reality

January 04, 2006
When Cisco announces a new product strategy, people in networking pay attention regardless of who they are....
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Management software in 2006

January 03, 2006
IBM set the stage for the upcoming year when it last month announced plans to acquire Micromuse by the end of this quarter....
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Home for the holidays?

December 23, 2005
A recent survey performed by Osterman Research and released by Exchange software management vendor Zenprise found that almost 50% of e-mail administrators will be working...
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Managing tech silos

December 22, 2005
Despite the industry's best efforts to bridge the gaps among various IT disciplines within an organization, a majority of network managers report that they still...
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IBM finds its Muse

December 21, 2005
IBM today announced it signed an agreement to acquire network management software maker Micromuse for $865 million....
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Performance anxiety:

December 20, 2005
Network managers want to monitor application performance but fear data overload....
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Standards support:

December 19, 2005
IBM kicked off its integration plans for 2006 early....
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Should Cisco buy more mgmt.?

December 16, 2005
Cisco caused quite a stir of activity among industry watchers since announcing its plans last week to get into the management software market....
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Managed best practices

December 15, 2005
As more companies look to align their internal processes with best practices such as ITIL, vendors and service providers must also step up and familiarize...
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Itchin' for ITIL

December 13, 2005
More American companies are looking to adopt the best practice framework borrowed from the Brits....
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NNM makes the grade

December 13, 2005
HP OpenView Network Node Manager (NNM) has long been a favorite among network managers and recently a comparative test of the network management software proved...
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Open to management

December 12, 2005
Oftentimes the downside of implementing tools to manage your network is the cost and complexity of the software needed....
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How is Cisco like a fine wine?

December 09, 2005
It's moving to NAPA....
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Managing e-mail

December 08, 2005
A recent survey by Exchange management software maker Zenprise revealed that companies with more than 5,000 employees are spending more than $1 million annually to...
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Survey says more automation needed

December 07, 2005
A recent poll of more than 300 network managers at large enterprises found that the majority wants to see more automation features in their management...
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Fluke Networks buys Visual

December 06, 2005
Fluke Networks, maker of network testing software, WAN management tools and handheld protocol analyzers, last week announced it had agreed to buy network and application...
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Hands-off management

December 05, 2005
Network managers are finally ready to make the leap from reactive monitoring to proactive management -- and one key factor in that decision is the...
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More free stuff

December 02, 2005
You cannot get too much free stuff....
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CA's app mgmt. plans

December 01, 2005
CA is going to acquire an application management vendor in 2006, maybe even sooner....
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HP stays busy

November 30, 2005
HP today announced it was buying the federated identity management company with which it last year signed a licensing agreement....
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Never too many tips

November 29, 2005
This week in Network World we pulled together a special package of stories that provide tips on hardware, software, careers and more....
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Tackling change

November 28, 2005
Citigroup has tens of thousands of network devices....
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Don't call it a comeback

November 14, 2005
CA's been here for years -- but not like this. The problem Computer Associates has had in the past few years involved more cleaning up...
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BMC's value add

November 14, 2005
The problem with the leading management software vendors, at least for me, is that it's often difficult to distinguish the technology from the marketing pitch....
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Not the same old Sniffer

November 14, 2005
As a member of the press, I can only imagine how long network managers have wanted to take the concentrated analysis and trouble-shooting capabilities of...
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Application intelligence

November 02, 2005
Network management vendors that may not be ready to tout business service management (BSM) strategies could still have a leg up on the IBMs and...
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Survey says

November 02, 2005
Compuware recently discussed results of its survey of some 200 senior IT decision-makers, and the application management software maker found that the majority of respondents...
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Desktop dilemma

November 02, 2005
Desktop management is evolving from a mundane workaday task to a critical component to overall enterprise management....
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Counting on configuration

October 11, 2005
Network device change and configuration management could be getting easier for network managers....
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Commercial grids

October 11, 2005
OK so THE grid -- the one in which everyone opens their firewalls to share processing power worldwide -- isn't any closer to happening, but...
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Dashboards in demand

October 11, 2005
Hurwitz & Associates recently surveyed more than 110 IT executives to get to the bottom of the demand of portal-like interfaces that show performance data,...
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Process palooza

September 26, 2005
In theory, best practice frameworks such as ITIL, COBIT and Six Sigma deliver streamlined operations, potential cost savings and compliance with internal and external policies....
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Vendor best practices

September 26, 2005
Technically a vendor product, such as management software, can't claim to be best practice certified....
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Shopaholic HP

September 26, 2005
HP last week continued its years-long shopping spree when it picked up AppIQ and Peregrine....
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VoIP management maturity

September 13, 2005
Voice over IP has reached the point at which IT managers are readying to buy tools to manage it....
Comments (1)

Supporting SOA

September 06, 2005
Not only is IBM tackling virtualized environments, Big Blue is also working on products to manage Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) enabled applications, and with recent accolades...
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Management providers: Software vs. hardware

September 06, 2005
Cisco is making its move to manage the networks it provides....
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Virtual management

September 06, 2005
Systems management vendors are prepping products to help IT managers get a handle on their virtual environments....
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Neck and neck

August 17, 2005
HP and IBM recently made news around their market-leading positions, as reported by research firm IDC....
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Where's Tivoli?

August 17, 2005
IBM last week made news around its WebSphere brand with a new software product designed to automatically distribute workload across Big Blue's application server platform....
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ITIL and COBIT

August 17, 2005
A recent survey by Evergreen Systems revealed that more companies are interested in adopting IT best practices, such as those detailed in the Information Technology...
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Cross-platform computing

August 10, 2005
As more and more companies adopt Linux as an enterprise-scale operating system, more vendors are stepping up to the plate with tools to manage the...
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Putting money in mgmt.

August 10, 2005
Venture funding seems to be on the rise and software companies are getting the lion's share of the loot....
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EMC moving into mgmt.

August 10, 2005
EMC last week went on a tour so to speak talking up the company's strategy, which includes using technology it acquired from SMARTS....
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ITIL talk

August 01, 2005
Getting IT best practices in place isn't an easy task. According to Michele Hudnall, director of service management at Managed Objects and former Meta Group...
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Cisco gets further into mgmt. game

August 01, 2005
Cisco this week increased its management arsenal with its plans to acquire Sheer Networks. Cisco says Sheer's products, Sheer Dynamic Network Abstraction, or DNA, will...
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Pay for what you use

August 01, 2005
Pricing software as a service is taking off for many applications vendors, but don't discount the benefit of getting outsourced management services. Companies such as...
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HP restructures

July 25, 2005
It's inevitable that large companies under new management undergo changes. Last week the inevitable happened to HP....
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Sorting out SOA

July 25, 2005
Services-oriented architecture (SOA) will change how the majority of companies handle computing....
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My money is on management

July 18, 2005
Venture capitalists have been investing more this year and one area that seems to spark their interest is management technologies....
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Making IDs manageable

July 18, 2005
HP last week took advantage of the Burton Group Catalyst Conference to showcase its upgraded OpenView identity and access management products....
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Testing server management

July 18, 2005
Network World tester Tom Henderson this week evaluates how well QCD Microsystems' InterStructures 1.0.4 stacks up to its claims to manage Linux servers from a...
Comments (0)

Security: Hard to manage

July 11, 2005
Management vendors have been incrementally adding security features to their wares for the past couple of years now....
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Traffic management

July 11, 2005
Want to get rid of unwanted spam and better protect yourself against hackers?...
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How to measure performance

July 11, 2005
Application performance remains one of those IT metrics that varies based on who you talk to -- even within the same company....
Comments (1)

Small companies, big growth

June 27, 2005
More and more enterprise-class vendors are starting to package their products for small to midsize customers....
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ITIL and the desktop

June 27, 2005
Best practices mania is trickling all the way down to the desktop. Recent research from firms such as Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) and Forrester Research...
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Integrity management

June 27, 2005
Every week a new buzzword comes up that leaves all of us wondering, "What's the difference between that and what the vendor did last week?"...
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ITIL in action

June 13, 2005
For those of you considering IT best practices, be sure to read our real world accounts from IT managers currently in the process of getting...
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SMASHing server success

June 13, 2005
Systems management could get a whole lot easier for you....
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Spending slide

June 13, 2005
A recent Forrester Research survey of about 200 CIOs at North American companies shows IT spenders don't have a positive view of the future....
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Managing security

May 30, 2005
The lines continue to blur between management and security technologies. More and more vendors are applying the tenets of network management to help IT managers...
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Troubleshooting tips

May 30, 2005
Network managers depend on their own smarts as much as vendor tools....
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Automated monitoring

May 30, 2005
IT managers are expected to stay on top of a lot of data and ensure the network -- and the applications using it -- perform...
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Bye-bye Patrol

May 23, 2005
BMC this week announced it would be doing away with its decade-old product name Patrol and replace it with another that the company says is...
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IBM advises on ITIL

May 23, 2005
IBM Tivoli last week announced it would be releasing four new products and updating some 14 others with capabilities to automatically track changes and configurations...
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Consolidation benefits customers

May 23, 2005
The number of players in the network and systems management market is shrinking, but that's not a bad thing for customers of performance monitoring products....
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Open management

May 16, 2005
Network and systems management vendors are going to start to see some competition from the open source community....
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Server skills

May 16, 2005
As more and more servers proliferate, vendors continue to make managing the lot easier. This week Heroix and Opsware separately released new products that will...
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Management databases

May 16, 2005
IBM this week joined a growing number of management vendors that intend to house application, system and network configuration data in a federated repository to...
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IP management

May 09, 2005
Data center consolidation, VoIP and security risks such as virus infection have network managers looking to better manage IP addresses....
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Application management vs. ...

May 09, 2005
Application performance on LANs and WANs is concern Number One for IT managers, according to a Forrester Research survey....
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... application delivery

May 09, 2005
According to Peter Sevcik, president of NetForecast and founder of a new industry organization working to create a standard for measuring application performance, the LAN...
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OpenView steps up

April 25, 2005
After years of shopping, HP's OpenView management software division is going to buckle down....
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Easing app headaches

April 25, 2005
Applications seem to be what are on many network managers' minds lately....
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Security management

April 25, 2005
"Network anomaly detection gives an indication of security-relevant behavior observed in a network and can be particularly valuable in the identification and containment of worms, for example," says Scott Crawford, an analyst with Enterprise Management Associates.
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CA makes noise

April 12, 2005
Computer Associates President and CEO John Swainson last week unveiled some five months worth of decision-making when the new chief shared with the press and...
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Quallaby finds its Muse

April 12, 2005
Speaking of acquisitions, Micromuse also last week announced it would acquire Quallaby and incorporate its performance management software, Proviso, into Muse's flagship Netcool fault management...
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Software recycling

April 12, 2005
With tight budgets and short staff, just about everyone in IT is being asked to do more than their share. Isn't it about time the...
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Interest in ITIL

April 04, 2005
The Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) is getting a lot of attention these days. The set of IT best practices features a dozen or so...
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Curbing compliance drift

April 04, 2005
With Sarbanes-Oxley and HIPAA deadlines looming, IT managers are being forced to stay on top of compliance in their day-to-day IT operations....
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Measuring performance

April 04, 2005
A group of vendors have joined forces with the goal of defining a measure of user satisfaction with application performance....
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Compliance cornucopia

March 21, 2005
With deadlines looming and more regulations to come, technology to help become compliant will top many IT managers list of things to buy in 2005....
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Researching grid

March 21, 2005
Doctors at Children's Memorial Research Center in Chicago recently discovered how grid technology could cure their research woes....
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Embracing automation

March 21, 2005
IT automation technologies for years have filled IT managers' minds with great promise and fear: promise of enabling more efficient operations and fear of losing...
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Managing mainframes

March 07, 2005
IBM Tivoli and Computer Associates last week made their position on mainframes known. The two management heavyweights separately announced wares to keep zSeries in line....
Comments (1)

BSM battle

March 07, 2005
Another network management veteran is looking to get into the business service management (BSM) game. Micromuse, known for its Netcool fault management product that often...
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Automation action

March 07, 2005
The hottest trend in management start-ups lately is automation, with recent news from companies such as Optier, Optinuity and RealOps....
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Are you VoIP ready?

February 07, 2005
Vendors at this week's VoiceCon show in Orlando want to help answer that question for enterprise IT managers....
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Network lockdown

February 07, 2005
Heavyweights such as Cisco, IBM and Microsoft aren't the only vendors looking to provide enterprise IT teams with lockdown capabilities....
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Application optimization

February 07, 2005
While poor application performance has never been acceptable, there are more and more reasons why applications that face customers on a company Web site or...
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Money-making acquisition

January 24, 2005
IBM last April announced its plans to acquire Candle, a sometimes competitor in the mainframe management market with IBM's own Tivoli Software division....
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Continued interest in configuration

January 24, 2005
Configuration management vendors seemed to come out of the woodwork in 2004, spurring management heavyweights to acquire and develop their own configuration management wares....
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Data center automation

January 24, 2005
Forrester Research recently put out a paper detailing how enterprise companies should select a data center automation vendor....
Comments (1)

Post-holiday shopping

January 10, 2005
Concord this week announced it would acquire competitor Aprisma Management Technologies....
Comments (0)

IT spending

January 10, 2005
IT budget dollars will continue to inch upward at a slow and steady pace, between 6% and 9% over 2004 budgets, according to market research...
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Automation's future

January 10, 2005
According to Forrester Research, data center automation technologies are maturing, and most enterprises are now both aware of, and interested in, these core technologies of...
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IBM's secret weapon

December 08, 2004
IBM has an arsenal of product offerings, but the company plans to make its Tivoli software division the keeper of automation that could help customers...
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Considering CCM

December 08, 2004
Change and configuration management technology is topping vendor wishlists this holiday season. Last week HP and this week BMC revealed how they plan to make...
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Take the Citadel challenge

December 08, 2004
Citadel Security Software this week challenged security software manufacturers providing products for automating the resolution of IT vulnerabilities to defend their product claims....
Comments (0)

Piecing together patch

November 24, 2004
Last week Network World Fusion hosted on online virtual debate "How best to patch" in which six vendors from various technology buckets made the case...
Comments (0)

Management mindshare

November 24, 2004
In the years that I have covered network and systems management products from literally hundreds of vendors, I learned one thing: these products are complex...
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Open mgmt. mind

November 24, 2004
For those willing to explore the open source world, Nagios is an open source host, service and network monitoring program....
Comments (0)

You pose the patch question

November 17, 2004
This week Senior Editor John Fontana and I -- along with guest analyst Felicia Nicastro from International Network Services -- have taken charge on Network...
Comments (0)

ITIL adoption spreads

November 17, 2004
The British-born IT best practices framework is having an American revolution. The Information Technology Infrastructure Library has piqued the interest of more than one-third of...
Comments (1)

Stress testing

November 17, 2004
Our Network World Test Alliance gurus have been at it again. This time they tackled network vulnerability assessment management tools from eight vendors including Qualys,...
Comments (1)

Virtual Showdown: Getting patching right

November 10, 2004
On Monday, Nov. 15, Network World will launch an all-week online debate featuring vendors from three sectors involved in the patching puzzle: pure-play patch management...
Comments (0)

Simply SMASHING

November 08, 2004
The Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF) has long worked to provide management standards to vendors and end-user organizations that would make getting a handle on...
Comments (0)

Utility computing to come

November 08, 2004
Recent survey data from Gartner says that despite the hype associated with vendor claims around utility computing, it is on its way and could be...
Comments (0)

Happy anniversary

November 08, 2004
Advocates of a standard that proposes to help data center components communicate are celebrating its birthday. The Data Center Markup Language (DCML) promises to be...
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Win/win situation

November 08, 2004
HP is giving away Apple iPods to customers ready to sing the praises of the company's technology and services....
Comments (0)

United front

October 20, 2004
IBM and Cisco both seem to realize that they can't do it all on their own. By all, I mean connect, secure, provision and manage...
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BSM at work

October 20, 2004
All the hype around business service management (BSM) makes even the most cynical network folks wonder is there any truth to the promises. And because...
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More money

October 20, 2004
According to industry research firm Meta Group, IT staff salaries will increase by as much as 10%-15% over the next three years....
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The good, the bad and CA

October 11, 2004
Computer Associates hasn't had the best luck over the past few years. First accounting scandals, then a management shakedown, and then layoffs topped news about...
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Business buzz

October 11, 2004
Security management vendors have joined the legion of vendors adding capabilities to their management products to somehow relate network events back to the business. Most...
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You know best

October 11, 2004
When it comes to writing about networking, Network World may know best. But when it comes to setting up and securing home networks, we turned...
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Business services management

September 27, 2004
BSM technology promises to help network managers deliver optimal IT services in line with critical business processes. The promise is appealing: software that sorts through...
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HP adapts its strategy

September 27, 2004
HP last week unveiled a new set of services and software that will help customers roll out and manage blades in their data centers. HP...
Comments (0)

IT spending flatlines

September 27, 2004
Like a watched pot that never boils, IT spending forecasts continue to simmer on the edge of optimism. Forecasts from multiple research firms show IT...
Comments (0)

Business policy effort

September 22, 2004
A group of application and traffic management companies have joined forces with research firm APM Advisors to develop a common structure of an application and...
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Management plans

September 22, 2004
A recent Society for Information Management (SIM) survey of top IT executives found that IT and Business Alignment still tops the list of top 10...
Comments (1)

Service management interest

September 22, 2004
Summit Strategies recently surveyed about 130 enterprise IT managers about their plans to implement service-level management (SLM) or the IT Infrastructure Library standards in their...
Comments (0)

Process paranoia

September 07, 2004
A recent study completed by business process management (BPM) vendor FileNet in conjunction with The Economist Intelligence Unit in the U.K. found that a majority...
Comments (1)

Compliance concerns

September 07, 2004
Most likely the majority of IT managers need to worry about getting their processes, infrastructure and applications into compliance for one or more industry regulations....
Comments (0)

Business buzz

September 07, 2004
Management vendors just can't stop talking about business services and business process. Companies such as BMC and HP keep throwing the business word into product...
Comments (0)

American ITIL

August 30, 2004
The IT Infrastructure Library is gaining steam among U.S. companies, yet the prospect of changing the way IT works is still a challenging one to...
Comments (0)

Aerospace IT spending

August 30, 2004
A recent report from AMR Research this week shows that IT spending in the Aerospace and Defense (A&D) industry will remain flat. But that doesn't...
Comments (0)

Security and net traffic

August 30, 2004
A new approach to spotting security breaches involves more than guarding the network perimeter. Now traffic management technology can be put to use to also...
Comments (0)

Mgmt. integration

August 23, 2004
Computer Associates last week went to great lengths to detail to members of the trade press how it will instrument all future software releases with...
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Building better apps

August 23, 2004
Predicting and controlling application performance remains a challenge for most network executives. A recent product announcement by Motive attempts to address the issue by giving...
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Including process

August 23, 2004
The next frontier for IT management vendors is adding process to their monitoring software. HP announced software in June, Computer Associates added its Business Process...
Comments (0)

Convergence of another kind

August 16, 2004
Network World has covered closely the many acquisitions completed by the likes of BMC, HP and IBM the past year or so. The companies separately...
Comments (0)

Automation nation

August 16, 2004
Or not so much. That is at least according to data recently released by Sage Research and Singlestep Technologies. The two groups interviewed about 16...
Comments (0)

USA for ITIL

August 16, 2004
The IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) is piquing the interest of more and more U.S. companies. When I first started to cover this area, the concept...
Comments (0)

Application management agenda

August 02, 2004
IBM purchased another start-up last week. This time Big Blue is adding to its application management portfolio with Cyanea Systems' Cyanea/One software, which company executives...
Comments (0)

Q2 spending quandary

August 02, 2004
Goldman Sachs recently surveyed 100 CIOs to determine why the bottom fell out for many software companies during the second quarter. The poll revealed that...
Comments (0)

Looking at logs

August 02, 2004
A new start-up is looking to manage syslog data for enterprise network managers. LogLogic, in Sunnyvale, Calif., says its appliance-based software can eliminate hours of...
Comments (0)

Systems mgmt. stats

July 19, 2004
Management software maker NetIQ this week shared with me some numbers they collected when surveying users about why systems management software is critical to enterprise...
Comments (0)

Opposing view

July 19, 2004
A separate collection of facts provided by business service management software maker Proxima shows that European companies have realized the pitfalls of systems management and...
Comments (0)

BPM and ROI

July 19, 2004
A recent Gartner research note states that 80% of enterprise companies conducting business process management (BPM) projects will experience an internal rate of return better...
Comments (0)

No buyer's remorse

July 05, 2004
BMC and HP both recently made available new products that wouldn't have been possible if the two vendors didn't have the cash to buy new...
Comments (0)

IT spending stable

July 05, 2004
Goldman Sachs' most recent survey shows capital spending on IT hardware and software is stabilizing....
Comments (0)

New free stuff

July 05, 2004
Imspire software recently made available a freeware download that includes a collection of popular network diagnostic tools....
Comments (1)

Management maven

June 28, 2004
While at Network World I own this title, HP'S Nora Denzel is definitely earning her rights to it as well. The HP general manager and...
Comments (0)

Business and IT

June 28, 2004
The past few weeks I have been hearing from management companies such as HP about how they are managing business services in concert with IT...
Comments (0)

Performance anxiety

June 28, 2004
While management vendors gear up to add business management to their product suites, an industry group is working toward developing standards for business performance management....
Comments (0)

Clarifying utility computing

June 21, 2004
Last week while I was in Montreal covering HP Software Forum, I took the opportunity to speak with Nick van der Zweep, director of Virtualization...
Comments (0)

Coming up on compliance

June 21, 2004
Another issue topping vendor presentations lately is compliance. Because I cover management closely, I am hearing a lot about products that will help CEOs, CFOs,...
Comments (0)

Business case for IT

June 21, 2004
In the past, business units and IT groups mutually co-existed, without having to interact too often in terms of planning. Today, most IT managers...
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Mgmt. melee

June 14, 2004
Application management is the untamed frontier in the world of management software. Vendors are competing for every piece of the market, and competitors range from...
Comments (0)

Where in the world ...?

June 14, 2004
In the past two months, I have had the opportunity to travel to Las Vegas twice and New York once (and also Miami, but that...
Comments (0)

Commoditized?

June 14, 2004
In reporting stories recently, specifically about application management and Aprisma's user conference, I have been hearing more and more that network management capabilities are becoming...
Comments (0)

Wireless wonder

June 07, 2004
A few week back when I was at NetWorld+Interop, I got the chance to speak briefly with Cathy Cathy Callagee, vice president of IS with...
Comments (0)

Scout's honor

June 07, 2004
A free download from ITWorx's NetCelera line of WAN application acceleration tools could help network managers better understand how their applications use wide-area bandwidth. Scout...
Comments (0)

Rumor mill

June 07, 2004
As I prepare to head out to HP Software Forum in Montreal next week, I am working through a rumor that I heard. HP wants...
Comments (1)

Putting on a panel

May 31, 2004
Last week at CeBit in New York I had the opportunity to present a panel discussion on the current state of network and systems management...
Comments (0)

To PPT or not to PPT

May 31, 2004
On a side note, at the CeBit panel, a last-minute mix up left my panelists and myself without access to our multiple PPT reports. The...
Comments (0)

CA World report

May 31, 2004
Also last week, I took a trip to Vegas to learn what's new with Computer Associates. And apparently there is news, and news that goes...
Comments (0)

CA World

May 24, 2004
Computer Associates this week will host users of its products at the company's annual CA World conference in Las Vegas. The company is currently attempting...
Comments (0)

Standard practice

May 24, 2004
Coincidentally at CA World, the DCML (data center markup language) Organization will announce its plans for Version 1.0 of the specification. DCML promises to make...
Comments (0)

And more free tools

May 24, 2004
Thing I love about this job is the readers. I write an article about freeware, and then I just wait for the e-mails to come...
Comments (0)

More free stuff

May 10, 2004
In a recent article, I discussed several freeware and shareware applications that could be useful for enterprise IT managers. In response, readers sent along some...
Comments (0)

Show business

May 10, 2004
N+I is upon us this week, and it seems the vendors participating are making more product news than in years past....
Comments (0)

Data center careers

May 10, 2004
Research firms reporting on the trend for offshore outsourcing say that new technologies that automate tasks and virtualize network, server and storage resources could also...
Comments (0)

Free stuff

May 03, 2004
The best things in life are free. And at Network World, the best things in work are freeware and shareware. The free or often low-priced...
Comments (0)

N+I news

May 03, 2004
NetWorld+Interop 2004 will be held next week at the Las Vegas Convention Center. About 350 vendors plan to roll out their latest wares for the...
Comments (0)

Acquisition happy

May 03, 2004
BMC Software last week added another company to its roster when it announced its plans to acquire Marimba, a maker of change and configuration management...
Comments (0)

Mercury's brass ring

April 26, 2004
Mercury Interactive has big plans. The company wants to more than double its size in the next 10 years. And unlike some vendor claims, Mercury's...
Comments (0)

CA's woes

April 26, 2004
Computer Associates CEO and Chairman Sanjay Kumar last week abandoned those positions amid a series of firings and management changes -- set off by federal...
Comments (0)

Security and management

April 26, 2004
In a surprising move last week, Network Associates announced its plans to sell its Sniffer line of network and protocol analysis tools....
Comments (0)

Configuring it out

April 19, 2004
Network configuration management vendors this week face off in a Network World review. Greg Goddard and Curtis Franklin of our own Network World Alliance Lab...
Comments (0)

Bringing data together

April 19, 2004
Enterprise information integration is finally getting acknowledged as a critical component to utility computing. According to a recent report from Summit Strategies, date federation (bringing...
Comments (0)

Service management

April 19, 2004
Software makers are really on a service management kick these days. Often services are applications, sometimes they are business processes, but in any case, most...
Comments (0)

Merging management

April 19, 2004
Symantec was on the road recently discussing how it plans to integrate systems and storage management into its security product portfolios. Symantec's vision would create...
Comments (0)

Do your homework

April 12, 2004
A recent survey by Robert Half Technology of about 1,400 CIOs at U.S. companies found that about one-third recommend IT students focus their studies on...
Comments (0)

Appliance options

April 12, 2004
Network Intelligence announced a new line of appliances last week that support the company's latest revisions of security event management (SEM), sometimes referred to as...
Comments (0)

Mainframe mania

April 12, 2004
Last week marked the 40th anniversary of the mainframe. IBM unveiled last week a new mainframe within a week of purchasing mainframe management software maker...
Comments (0)

Economic refresh

April 05, 2004
Confidence in the economy is on the rise according to research firms IDC and Forrester Research, but that doesn't necessarily mean IT spending will recover...
Comments (0)

To err is human

April 05, 2004
A new study from CompTIA, the Computing Technology Industry Association, says 84% of 900 organization that participated in this year's survey "blamed human error either...
Comments (0)

Data management

April 05, 2004
Addamark Technologies last week announced a new version of its Omnisight software that lets IT managers save logs from security and network devices, among others,...
Comments (0)

Local business

April 05, 2004
Local to the Boston area that is. The New England Business and Technology Association last week hosted an event to discuss business process performance management....
Comments (0)

Report cards

March 29, 2004
Research firm Summit Strategies has released its latest utility computing report card -- and Dell for the first time is on the list of vendors...
Comments (0)

Managing integration

March 29, 2004
Wily Technology continues to improve on its Java Platform, Enterprise Edition (J2EE) products with the release of Introscope 5.0 and the company's new PowerPacks for...
Comments (0)

Converging security and management

March 29, 2004
A new product from Q1 Labs is said to use network traffic patterns to spot security breaches. QRadar software first learns how the network typically...
Comments (0)

Networking in demand

March 22, 2004
A recent study buy Robert Half Technology found that among 1,400 CIOs surveyed about 11% plan to add to their IT staff in the second...
Comments (0)

Job cut reality check

March 22, 2004
Also separate research from Challenger, Gray & Christmas shows that the 228,325 technology job cuts in 2003 accounted for about 18.5% of all jobs cut....
Comments (0)

The little guys

March 22, 2004
Apparently, network managers don't always have to invest a lot of money to get management services. There are service provider -like companies that perform similar...
Comments (0)

Recapping

March 22, 2004
The management matters series we talked about last week is now fully online. the series spotlights corporate network executives' innovative use of management products to...
Comments (0)

Online series

March 15, 2004
Whether it be change, security or configuration, management eats up a lot of time in enterprise nets. Network managers struggle with how to make the...
Comments (0)

Shopaholic?

March 15, 2004
HP last week announced its plans to pick up another software maker. TruLogica, a Dallas-based maker of user-provisioning software, will round out HP's identity management...
Comments (0)

Picking up the papers

March 15, 2004
Network and management research seems abundant of late. From specific configuration management white papers from vendors to broader network operations center studies completed by consulting...
Comments (0)

Standard practice

March 08, 2004
IBM last week hosted its partners in Las Vegas for Big Blue's annual PartnerWorld conference. The show drew well-known vendors such Symantec, Siebel, Intel and...
Comments (0)

Still managing mainframes?

March 08, 2004
BMC is betting customers are. The company last week updated several products in its Mainview software line to enable IP application prioritization. Using a technology...
Comments (0)

Protocol-palooza

March 08, 2004
Last week Packet Design upgraded its Route Explorer appliance with the ability to support Cisco's Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (EIGRP). According to Cisco, EIGRP...
Comments (0)

Applications and outsourcing

March 01, 2004
A new study by Meta Group takes a look at applications, how they can be managed and if they should be outsourced. New technologies such...
Comments (0)

Spending optimism

March 01, 2004
Merrill Lynch recently released survey results showing CIOs expect their budgets to continue to grow throughout 2004. The firm says while the first half of...
Comments (0)

Security and business

March 01, 2004
The RSA Conference last week brought out more security information management vendors. Open Service and Intellitactics upgraded their wares to include more business-related information....
Comments (0)

Working on it

February 23, 2004
The Distributed Management Task Force last week announced the formation of the Utility Computing Working Group, which will create interoperable and common object models for...
Comments (0)

Patchwork

February 23, 2004
Patch management vendors want to add more intelligence to their tools to help enterprise network managers prevent virus outbreaks and plug holes before threats happen....
Comments (0)

Stay with the flow

February 23, 2004
Last week Senior Editor Phil Hochmuth detailed a management standard picking up steam within the IETF called sFlow. Apparently sFlow hasn't gotten too much attention...
Comments (0)

Managing security

February 16, 2004
Security event management could be evolving to address the level of intelligence that industry analysts had said products were missing last year. New features in...
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Data centers' day

February 16, 2004
The DCML Organization, founded last fall (see story) and working to provide a common language (Data Center Markup Language) for components in a data center...
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Delving into desktops

February 09, 2004
This week in Network World, Test Alliance reviewer Paul Ferrill takes a closer look at two products designed to manage desktops. NetSupport DNA impressed Ferrill...
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Shopping spree

February 09, 2004
HP made a lot of noise last week with its plans to acquire two software makers, and the company says the technology it intends to...
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Analyze this

February 09, 2004
A start-up intends to give companies such as Ipsum Networks and Packet Design a run for their money. Bluewave Networks this week will launch and...
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Application acceleration compared

February 02, 2004
APM Advisors last month released a paper analyzing application acceleration products from the likes of Cisco, F5 Networks, NetScaler and Redline Networks. The research firm...
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Portals and Web acceleration

January 26, 2004
History teaches us that management software often follows the adoption of new technologies. Take portals, for example. With more and more IT managers considering portals...
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Configuration catches on

January 19, 2004
Last year network device and server configuration management tools started to emerge, gaining attention in the areas of automation and utility computing. And already this...
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Linux management

January 12, 2004
A recent survey by SG Cowen revealed that of more than 500 IT shops , 65% planned to increase their use of Linux within the...
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Content-aware systems

January 05, 2004
Managing content in the past had largely been up to the content creator, but as enterprise companies realize how valuable their intellectual property is and...
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The woman behind HP's adaptive strategy

December 29, 2003
In 2003, HP's Nora Denzel took charge of the company's $2.5 billion Adaptive Enterprise utility computing product strategy. The software executive will face an uphill...
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Business process management

December 22, 2003
Prior to 2003, few vendors incorporated the word "business" in the names or descriptions of their IT products. Last year, many used the word to...
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Management in review

December 15, 2003
This week in Network World, our testers took on the task of reviewing network management tools and security event management software. Products such as Ipswitch's...
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Wrapping up the week

December 08, 2003
Utility computing has received lots of press this year , and I expect it will get its share of coverage next year as well. But...
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How to get started

December 01, 2003
This week in Network World my colleague Senior Editor Ann Bednarz and I explore how enterprise IT managers can get started with utility computing. The...
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What's in a name

November 24, 2003
Utility computing, or the recent push by management vendors to deliver intelligent hardware and automated software to build the new data center for enterprise customers,...
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HP scores with new services

November 17, 2003
Last week HP made a slew of product announcements across its software lines, and while a few new tools created a little utility computing buzz...
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Controlling app behavior

November 10, 2003
Application performance management is a challenge in any organization. But companies with multiple applications tied to external business partners and customers face the hurdle of...
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The human factor

November 03, 2003
The power of people seemed to be on everyone’s minds last week at the IT Infrastructure Management show in New Orleans. This was true from...
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Services on the menu

October 27, 2003
Management service providers emerged in 2000 as the way to quickly establish Web operations. The option to remotely monitor additional Web and application servers appealed...
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The new game in town

October 20, 2003
The past few weeks I've talked with a lot of vendors, and during that process, I became inspired to create a new game. It's a...
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No promises with bandwidth

October 13, 2003
A recent report released by Yankee Group (and commissioned by Packeteer) discusses the challenges enterprise network managers face when trying to support bandwidth-hungry applications and...
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App reality check

October 06, 2003
TeaLeaf Technology this week will announce the availability of its RealiTea Web application management software. The company says this release can measure the health of...
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Mercury and NetIQ take the next step

September 29, 2003
When I grow up ... ... I want to play with the big boys. That was the mantra I heard all last week at work...
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Management becomes mission-critical

September 22, 2003
Management software vendors for years have argued that there is no way to get a handle on network performance without investing in their programs. A...
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Managing security

September 15, 2003
A sure sign that summer is coming to an end is the slew of new product announcements coming out of vendors. This week the software...
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Baby steps

September 08, 2003
Last week HP made another move toward providing its customers with a broad range of utility computing offerings. The company announced its plans to acquire...
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And the winner is ...

September 01, 2003
Industry watchers, vendors, enterprise IT managers and the occasional journalist have debated for years over whether management frameworks or point products are better. The framework...
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Secret CA

August 25, 2003
Computer Associates last week made two new Unicenter products generally available, without telling anyone. After just announcing the technology behind the new product s in...
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Managing VoIP

August 18, 2003
Micromuse last week announced it added voice-over-IP management to its Netcool software portfolio. The vendor says its service assurance software can now also manage routers,...
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Reaping the rewards of research

August 11, 2003
Depending upon how you look at it, having around $5 billion to spend on researching just about any subject you wanted can be seen as...
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Guarded optimism on spending

August 04, 2003
"At last, the bleeding stops." Or so says a recent study on IT spending from Goldman Sachs. The global investment banking, securities and investment management...
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Offshore upset

July 28, 2003
It's happened again. Last week news leaked that IBM might be considering moving some of its jobs to an overseas location. The Seattle-based Washington Alliance...
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Battling for bandwidth

July 21, 2003
The ongoing struggle between enterprise networks and the applications that run on them continues, according to a recent survey conducted by Network World (and bandwidth...
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Vendors working for you

July 14, 2003
While no one can say these are the best of times, there may be benefits companies can reap in the down economy - especially when...
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Software vs. hardware

July 07, 2003
Last week in Network World I discussed the pros and cons of managing networks with either software or hardware. The debate goes on....
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From standards to appliances

June 30, 2003
Interest in management products is on the rise. The more bleeding-edge technologies that are developed, the greater the need for improved management practices and products....
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HP adapting, IBM integrating

June 23, 2003
Part of my job is to separate vendor talk from user reality. Or more appropriately, I talk with real world IT professionals and ask them...
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An old favorite

June 16, 2003
While HP talks a lot about its Adaptive Enterprise and technologies of the future, network managers I speak with keep asking me, "What's new in...
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Utility hype?

June 09, 2003
Maybe it's my management beat, but all I hear about every day is one or another big vendor's product push closer toward delivering real utility...
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Outsourcing woes

June 02, 2003
A few weeks ago, I touched upon a sensitive subject in a story regarding the dismal state of the IT job market. Research in the...
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Self help

May 26, 2003
Help desk vendors such as Remedy and Peregrine say their respective software is used by customers to help tie IT directly to business services. But...
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FCAPS for real?

May 19, 2003
management, FCAPS
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Ordering out

May 12, 2003
Outsourcing is back in vogue. IT managers trying to deliver more services to end-users without investing in equipment are looking more to "selective" or "strategic"...
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Identity management

May 05, 2003
The benefits of identity management can only be enjoyed if the software is properly deployed and integrated across networks, systems, databases, applications and directories. And that's a big if, according to one industry watcher.
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The power of process

April 21, 2003
ITIL, management
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Management is fundamental

April 13, 2003
The move toward tying business objectives directly into the IT infrastructure puts network and systems management vendors front and center. While newer technologies such as...
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Springtime and a young manager's thoughts turn to product roadmaps

April 07, 2003
It's officially spring, and that means network and systems management companies will begin hosting user conferences and detailing product roadmaps. It also means it's time...
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Free stuff

March 31, 2003
Network and systems management software can run a company between $10,000 and $10 million, depending on the size of the network and the complexity of...
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SLM is not SLA

March 24, 2003
The acronyms SLM (service-level management) and SLA (service-level agreement) are not synonymous. SLM, among accomplishing other goals, can help enterprise network managers automatically track how...
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ROI

March 17, 2003
Despite a tough economy, management vendors remain very busy prepping new wares to deliver ROI promises to enterprise companies. It makes perfect sense really: If...
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Security management

March 10, 2003
More and more management vendors are looking at ways to manage security. In fact two new acronyms emerged due to the interest in linking management...
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Web application management

March 03, 2003
Chances are most enterprise network managers saw their job duties change when upper management put business applications on the Web. Perhaps when companies first explored...
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Bilingual managers

February 24, 2003
Network managers today need to be bilingual. Not only do they need to master the ins and outs of syslog, TCP/IP, SNMP, J2EE, SOAP, and...
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