Compaq ProLiant 1850R Manual

HARVARD RESEARCH GROUP


COMPAQ'S CLUSTER MANAGEMENT INITIATIVE
Harvard Research Group has determined through extensive primary and secondary
research that today's business managers want Enterprise Management Systems that can
help them gain control over the business process and reduce complexity. IT managers are
increasingly looking for ways to effectively and efficiently implement new technologies
while at the same time achieve a seamless and cost effective way to manage their systems
and software. They want to "virtualize" their system environment and manage it as if it
were a single logical system. At the same time, the rapid growth in the number of
business-critical applications running on Intel-based systems coupled with the need for
high availability and continuous data access is driving the demand for clustered servers.
While clusters help solve problems with availability and scalability, they also bring
increased complexity, immature management tools, and added cost. This situation is most
evident in the Intel server market where the use of Microsoft Cluster Server (MSCS) is
accelerating faster than the capability of the tools that manage it.
Harvard Research Group has spoken with more than 700 users of highly available
systems. Our findings and research show that users of high availability systems typically
have mixed operating system and hardware environments, and believe that current cluster
system management tools are too complex and costly. They view the current set of
cluster administration tools as point products that are difficult to integrate, proprietary in
nature, and require too much time and money to properly implement. Many of them have
expressed the desire to reduce the complexity of cluster configuration, administration,
and problem determination / resolution. At the same time, they have expressed a desire to
minimize the number of interfaces and tools they need to manage their system and
clustered environments.
Harvard Research Group believes that all clustered solutions, still lack adequate and
extensible cluster monitor / management tools. While there are management tools that
partially address this issue for a particular operating environment (HP/UX, Solaris, NT),
they tend to be limited in their functionality and unable to address the larger issue of
managing multiple and dispersed cluster environments. This is contributing to the high
cost of ownership of server hardware and causing potential profits to be consumed by
increased administrative staff and lower user productivity. Studies have shown that
deploying manageable systems in concert with well managed IT processes can create
actual value for a company. It stands to reason, then, that tightly integrating cluster
management tools with the non-clustered systems management interface should create
more value.
It appears that Compaq, in concert with its acquisitions of Tandem Computer and Digital
Equipment Corporation, is building itself into an enterprise systems provider with some
key strides in changing the direction of enterprise systems management. In doing so,
Compaq has defined some interesting goals and is delivering on these goals.
Compaq's E2000 Platform Architecture and Cluster Management Vision
 Box 297  HARVARD, MA 01451 USA  http:/www.hrgresearch.com
HARVARD RESEARCH GROUP
Copyright 1999 Harvard Research Group. Reproduction is forbidden unless authorized.
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