Aims to help accelerate virtualization and cloud deployments
Asked where they’ll start their cloud use, many IT organizations say internally.
They have good reasons. With a private cloud, built using a cloud-in-a-box product or within a single server rack, they can contain the project and not worry about security or compliance, for example. Instead, they can focus on learning how to manage the cloud.
CLOUD-IN-A-BOX: Take the fast track to private clouds
It comes down to this: Many IT organizations that want to get into the cloud face a roadblock because they’re still learning how to manage the foundational virtualization technology, says Stephen Garrison, vice president of marketing at Infoblox, which last week announced new network infrastructure automation capabilities aimed at accelerating virtualization and cloud deployment. “They’ve either got skill set learning or trust issues, or are now adopting multiple hypervisors and are challenged by the need to manage heterogeneous environments with standard management tools that aren’t capable of that.”
Figuring out the network piece can be problematic, which is where the new functionality, added to the NetMRI technology Infoblox gained with last spring’s Netcordia acquisition, comes into play. Infoblox NetMRI 6.1 features capabilities that allow IT organizations to collect and analyze configurations, identify policy violations, see the impact of change on network health and remediate issues, the company says.
NetMRI 6.1 includes four primary new capabilities, Garrison says. One is dynamic templates, which enable IT organizations to configure specific devices matching unique profiles. This capability might come into play for branch office configurations where Gold builds are available for routers from different vendors, for example.
“We enable an IT team to have a Cisco template and an HP template, and knowing devices based on SNMP, we can trigger the right automation for those routers,” he describes. “So this is a simplification of the workflow and building Gold standard processes into a closed loop automation platform.”
Additional 6.1 capabilities are an automation sandbox, using Perl scripts, and customization tools; run book automation and a blacklist option for identifying and quarantining unauthorized devices, Garrison says.
Some of these new capabilities may sound mundane, but they reflect the reality of where IT is with virtualization and cloud today, he says. “If you can’t solve the simple problems, then you can’t move on to the complex ones.”
Infoblox NetMRI 6.1 is available on a range of Infoblox physical and virtual appliance platforms. U.S. pricing starts at $16,990, the company says.
