USENIX ;login: - Open Group Distributed System Management

The Open Group Distributed System Management

Nick Stoughton <nick@usenix.org> reports on the September 1997 meeting in Boston, MA.

The IT DialTone, as I have reported previously, is the new Open Group initiative to cause the creation of a viable global information infrastructure that is ubiquitous, trusted, reliable, and as easy to use as the telephone. Work is now under way on phase one of this project. Phase one is intended to be a consolidation of what exists, trying to bring it all together into the common direction toward which we are aiming. To this end, a taxonomy of management services has been produced, and work is under way to revise the X/Open Manageability Guidelines (a document presented for other working groups to understand where and how to include management interfaces in the work they are producing).

Manageability is one of the key elements of the IT DialTone. Within the IT DialTone environment, management extends beyond the traditional confines of managing IT platforms and networks. Successful management for the IT DialTone must provide a comprehensive management capability that encompasses the full end-to-end viewpoint that is experienced by the application programmers and users of the environment. Besides managing the infrastructure itself, it is also necessary for management to include the applications themselves, allowing them to be incorporated as manageable elements within the overall environment.

The table below enumerates a set of management areas and describes the environments in which they are applicable (i.e., a Managing Environment or a Managed Environment). In some cases, additional functions will be required to complete the management process. These additional functions may include manual processing.

This taxonomy is intended to provide a checklist against which the list of managed services can be validated for completeness. There is not a one-to-one correspondence between the management areas identified in the taxonomy and the proposed management services. Several issues may be addressed by a single service, and some issues may be instantiated across several services.

Further details about the IT Dialtone can be found at <https://www.opengroup.org>.

Application of Taxonomy to Managing, Managed Environment and Additional Functions

Managing Managed Additional

Environment Environment Functions

Business Management:

Inventory Control Yes Yes Yes

Accounting Yes Yes Yes

Policy Administration Yes

Business Strategic Planning Yes

Process Management Yes

Information Services Management Yes

Organizational Planning Yes

Configuration Management:

Configuration Design Yes Yes

Environmental Planning Yes

Configuration Creation Yes Yes

Updating Configuration Yes Yes

Accessing Configuration Yes Yes

Software Administration:

Licensing Yes Yes Yes

Planning Yes

Distribution Yes Yes

Synchronization Yes Yes

Installation Yes

Activation Yes Yes

Testing Yes

Backout Yes

Monitoring and Tracking Yes

Operations Management:

Workload and Operations Planning Yes

Workload Control Yes Yes

Operations Control Yes Yes

Print Management Yes

Performance Management:

Performance Planning Yes

Performance Control and Monitoring Yes

Performance Execution and Measurement Yes

Problem Management:

Problem Process Planning Yes Yes

Problem Policy Planning Yes Yes

Problem Determination Yes

Problem Analysis Yes Yes

Problem Bypass and Recovery Yes Yes

Problem Assignment Yes

Problem Resolution and Verification Yes Yes

Security Management:

Authentication Yes Yes

Access Control Yes Yes

Non-repudiation Yes

Integrity Yes Yes

Confidentiality Yes Yes

Security Audit Yes Yes Yes

Key Management Yes