Before leaving the area of performance alerting let’s delve into trending and analytical modelling and consider another important use of “capacity alerting.”
Most analysts and administrators focus intently on applications that are performing poorly or have the potential to do so in the near-term – as they should. But many I/S divisions are focusing on cost-containment and are trying to return as much value to the business units as possible.
Creating alerts that are generated when the system is likely underutilized can alert management to opportunities to undertake server consolidation activities and potentially reduce the cost of hardware, software, and support dollars as well.
Building such alerts may not be popular with everyone in the company – many professionals find servers that are over-configured and performing well to be an acceptable, if not exactly ideal, situation.
However, many of those professionals are judged on how well the application and system performs, not how well the overall capacity and dollar outlays are managed and controlled.
Since capacity planning is typically defined as providing “consistent and acceptable service at a controlled cost, it is just as important to focus in on controlling the cost of too much spare capacity as it is on providing the consistent and acceptable levels of service.
If this is not clear within the typical IT department, there is no doubt that other departments within the corporation will resent money being spent on redundant equipment rather than other investments they have on their list.
To download the full version of this blog visit http://www.metron-athene.com/_downloads/_documents/papers/too_many_servers.pdf
Rich Fronheiser
Consultant
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