* Focus shifting to application management
New applications such as voice over IP and video are going to change the way network managers deal with application performance. In fact, the move to more IP-based applications may leave some network managers feeling a bit more like application managers.
Traditionally, network managers ensure LAN devices and WAN performance remain up to snuff, either with monitoring tools or creative network architectural engineering, but industry watchers say the trend to adopt more IP-based applications will have network managers caring more about application performance than feeds and speeds.
In fact, the switch from network engineers exclusively caring about ports and bandwidth to also monitoring application service levels will initially challenge most IT shops. Optimizing performance of IP-based applications will take new technologies as well as new perspectives on the part of network engineers.
“The real problem is that people roles will be changing, and no one is sure quite yet into what they will be changing,” says Jasmine Noel, a principal analyst at research firm Ptak, Noel & Associates. “There is going to be confusion over where the network and the network managers’ responsibilities end and when the application team takes over. In this converged world, how the application behaves tightly depends on how it’s being routed through the infrastructure and really who has responsibility for that?”
VoIP will test today’s networks and IT shops to better track performance through a few different parameters, such as latency, jitter and packet loss.
VoIP applications are forcing one vice president of IT to reassess how he manages all traffic on his network. At White Electronic Designs, a provider of integrated silicon and advanced packaging services in Phoenix, Ariz., voice is pushing the current network to its limits, says James Kritcher. To get a handle on it in the future, he says the staff will have to find new tools and start thinking differently about how it manages the LAN and WAN if the company decides to support a fully converged IP network.
“We’ll need analyzers with expert diagnostic capabilities for both data and VoIP traffic,” Kritcher says. “You can’t run VoIP systems the way you do your LAN and WAN because of the dual nature of voice technology and data network technology.”
