Red Hat Isn't Alone at the Linux Management Table

By: Jacqueline Emigh
Monday, February 3, 2003 11:24:30 AM EST
URL: http://www.linuxplanet.com/linuxplanet/reports/4654/1/

Joining the League of Enterprise Management Systems

Red Hat made a big splash at LinuxWorld Expo by rolling out a new product and future roadmap for systems management. Meanwhile, with Linux making more enterprise inroads, Computer Associates (CA), IBM, SuSE, SCO, and many other players also showed off Linux-enabled management wares.

The first two components of Red Hat's "enterprise systems management framework" are a software delivery and maintenance module, already part of Red Hat Advanced Server, and a systems management module, just released as Red Hat Command Center.

Red Hat will add more modules to the framework in the future, said John Santinelli, director of product management, during a press conference at LinuxWorld. Possibilities under consideration include user management, provisioning, and profile management, Santinelli acknowledged in an interview.

Acquired last fall from NOCpulse, and then integrated with Advanced Server's Red Hat Network (RHN), Command Center runs only on Red Hat Linux. However, the product also manages servers and devices running on all other Linux distributions, Microsoft 2000/NT, Sun Solaris, HP-UX, IBM AIX, and FreeBSD.

On the other hand, the existing distribution/management module in Advanced Server works with Red Hat servers only, Santinelli said.

Likewise, the competing YaST systems management and maintenance tool supports SuSE and UnitedLinux distributions only, said Holger Dyroff, SuSE Linux's director of sales for North America. The UnitedLinux consortium--which includes SCO, Turbolinux, and Conectiva, along with SuSE--has adopted YaST from SuSE, its initial developer.

SuSE's YaST2 was one of seven finalists in the Systems Administration category of the LinuxWorld Open Source Product Excellence Awards. Volution Manager, a multiplatform management product from SCO, won the category.

Red Hat's new Command Center is available as either as a Red Hat-hosted service or as a server software product, run by customers in "satellite mode."

Specific features include configuration management; operations monitoring; asset management; e-mail and pager alerts, with automatic escalation; and historical, trend, and SLA reporting, with administrator-defined access rights and "full-blown graphing," Santinelli said. On the asset management side, administrators can keep track of lease IDs and serials numbers, for instance.

The product also enables management of system applications and third-party devices such as Cisco routers. Red Hat's "multitenant back end" will accommodate WebSphere, BEA, and database plug-ins, for example.

Instead of agents, which sit on client devices, Command Center uses sensors known as Local Scouts and Remote Scouts.

Sitel Corporation is already using Red Hat Advanced Server for software distribution and management, with plans to deploy Command Center in satellite and proxy mode during Q2, said Scott D. Clark, Sitel's director of systems engineering.

Previously, Sitel underwent a "failed Tivoli deployment," as well as less than postive experiences with Microsoft's Systems Management Server (SMS). With Tivoli, set up time for customers took up to 30 days, according to Clark.

"We've had a lot of problems with SMS, and it's very expensive," Clark maintained. Using Advanced Server's built-in software distribution/maintenance module, Clark finds it easier to install patches and errata.

OpSource, a service provider launched last June, has already used both RHN and Command Center. Prior to starting OpSource, the company founders had "a fair amount of experience (with) systems management products," said John Rowell, VP of engineering and operations. "We'd been burned."

Before deciding on Red Hat's approach, OpSource looked at other tools, including Macromuse's Netcool. Red Hat's management software, though, is "fun to use and lower in cost." Rowell also likes its smaller footprint. "It transfers its data in a secure manner," he contended.

Other Members of the Club

On the LinuxWorld showfloor, CA shined the spotlight on 16 different management products for heterogenous enterprises. All told, CA produces 60 solutions supporting Linux, said John Pincomb, CA's VP of marketing.

Unicenter Management Portal, one of the 16 products on display, provides browser-based, process-oriented views of statistics generated by Unicenter.

The portal currently runs on Red Hat, SuSE, and SCO/Calders distributions of Linux, along with Windows 2000/NT; Solaris, AIX, and Linux for OS/390, said Andrew Dienger, a developer for HP. Going forward, CA is supporting RedHat and United Linux.

Unicenter Management Portal is geared to network and systems administrators, as well as business managers, according to Dienger. "You can look at the information, but you can't change anything."

CA will port much of its remaining software to Linux, too, "but only as appropriate," Pincomb noted. "Some of our stuff that runs on mainframes is relevant to Linux, but some of it isn't."

HP, in contrast, is ultimately planning Linux support for all its software, said Judy Chavez, HP's worldwide director for Unix.

For the most part, HP will support UnitedLinux and Red Hat only, according to Chavez. Yet HP will also keep providing certain products--including scientific software tools--on other Linux distributions, such as Debian.

Operations Manager and Performance Manager--the two linchpins of HP OpenView--currently run only on HP-UX, Solaris and Windows. HP, though, also offers agents for all major platforms, including Linux.

IBM, another big Linux backer, made a couple of announcements around network and systems management at LinuxWorld. Later this year, IBM will extend Lotus iNotes Web Access to Linux clients. Domino-side support is expected in March, and client-side support during the second half of 2003.

For zSeries and xSeriers machines, IBM unveiled Tivoli System Automation, a software product for policy-based self-healing.

Director 4.1 on IBM eServer Blade Center was another finalist for systems integration in this year's Open Source Product Excellence Awards. Aside from SCO's Volution Manager and SuSE's YaST2, other contenders included CA's Unicenter Network and Systems Management; ActiveState's PureMessage; Novell's eDirectory 8.7; and Ximian's Red Carpet Enterprise.