Audrey Rasmussen
The art and science of management
IT management can be approached from multiple perspectives and levels. When looking at the reality and vision of the approaches there are two particular aspects that are interesting: the art and science of management.
What are your options for managing Linux?
The noise surrounding Linux continues to grow and Linux is steadily gaining a foothold in the enterprise as a server platform. The open source movement has definitely provided an alternative platform choice for IT consumers, who...
How a reader became a believer in agentless monitoring
A few weeks ago, I wrote two articles on agent and agentless monitoring, and I received an interesting note from a reader who shared his experiences with both. Today’s column includes excerpts from the note by our reader, a global...
Management is different for SMBs, remote offices
Small and midsized businesses and remote branch offices are challenging environments for those who have to manage them and keep the infrastructure running. Some of the challenges are due to the nature of these environments - such as...
What is IPMI?
Earlier this month, I wrote about agent and agentless management approaches. That article elicited a few responses from readers, which I shared with you in a subsequent issue. I have just received another response, this time from a...
DMTF spec promises to make managing hardware easier
The management of servers has traditionally been very proprietary and platform-specific. IT organizations have aligned their administrative support teams by type of server because each platform has its unique characteristics and...
Mailbag: Agents and agentless management
Last week, I wrote an article on the trend of vendors providing both agent-based and agentless monitoring and management. I received feedback from several readers that I thought I’d share in this week’s column.
Agent or agentless monitoring? It's your choice
An interesting trend is happening in system management: the coming together of agent and agentless monitoring. In the past, these two approaches were typically an either or kind of choice where customers had to choose philosophically...
BMC’s Patrol evolves into Performance Manager
Last week BMC announced Performance Manager, which the company calls the next generation of Patrol. Essentially, BMC is combining the functionality of Patrol Express and classic Patrol into the new product.
IBM helps customers with IT processes
Last week, IBM announced the rollout of IT Service Management, which offers customers assistance with codifying, developing and improving IT processes. There are many components to the announcement, and it leverages IBM’s Tivoli,...
Latest management initiatives demand better tools
It’s interesting how the world of management has changed. In the recent past, I’ve written about management tools that are “good enough” for some IT organizations because they don’t have the money to spend on more robust management...