Changing the face of Capacity Management solutions

Firstly, let me wish you a Happy New Year.... So what does the New Year have in store for Athene?

As ever we’ll be extending the range of metrics we provide.   For example there will be additional performance metrics for Oracle, z/VM and Exchange 2010. The icing on the cake however will be the introduction of Integrator. 

But what is the Integrator - it sounds like something from an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie doesn’t it?

Well, Integrator is part of our Cloud Computing strategy along with other elements such as our collaboration with end to end transaction measurement specialists, Correlsense.  With technologies such as virtualization and cloud computing high on every company’s agenda the need to manage capacity is now becoming a necessity. In a recent Datacenter study Gartner recommended using one single tool for all your capacity management requirements....but does such a tool exist?

Yes it does – our Athene software.  The exciting thing about the addition of Integrator to the Athene suite is that it enables the import of data, in any format, from any source, into the core Athene Performance Database (PDB). Yes, you read that right – you’ll be able to import data in any format, from any source.

The ability to do this is going to prove invaluable to those of you who are trying to effectively capacity manage complex environments spanning a mixture of internal, external and hybrid clouds alongside your physical and virtual estates – you can even add in your mainframe, networks, power.... 

What you can use to gather performance and capacity data will not always be under your control in the Cloud so something that can pull together any available data and integrate it with all your reporting and planning initiatives will be essential.

With Athene you will only need to use one tool for all your capacity management requirements.

Now for those of you who are interested in how it works....

The data to be imported is described by Integrator Templates, where a key-hierarchy of keys and data fields can be specified. This template, created using a browser based interface, is then automatically converted to Athene Control Center templates which are then processed into database tables, ready for use by applications within the Athene suite.

With the data being integrated into the Athene PDB it can also be backed up as part of a standard SQL Server back-up schedule.

More to come on this later in 2011 – I’ll keep you posted....

Dave Watson
SVP, Development