Can AixBOMS be holistic?

Yes: AixBOMS can do holistic IT management and DCIM!

AixBOMS was specifically developed for the planning and efficient operation of data centres. Its DCIM quality has already been reviewed and awarded by various experts.

 

In examining the holistic character, our Advanced AixBOMS CMDB forms the key function. It ensures that all DCIM disciplines have the required data from the (other) management areas available at all times. Its rule set monitors all access and valid entries.

 

The object model makes a crucial contribution, which was specifically developed for IT and service management and is continuously maintained. It contains a wide selection of current object types with their characteristic properties and – which is important for holistic management – the ability to define relationships between objects in a way that reflects the actual dependencies in day-to-day operations. When new objects are created, these definitions, together with the rule set, form the basis for templates with pre-allocations and selection lists, which guarantee secure and simple processing and provide the foundation for mass processing and automation.

 

But it's not just the data model; the AixBOMS modules also contribute to holistic management. They cover all essential DCIM disciplines and are fully integrated into the standardised CMDB (ITIL). The numerous graphical editors such as Area Plan, RackView, FloorPlan, Power, Connectivity, Port, etc. access the database directly and offer drag-and-drop functionality, planning modes, bottleneck analyses, reports, and a range of inter-disciplinary management operations. The BSM module provides tree representations for service dependencies, root cause and impact analyses, supporting troubleshooting, proactive planning, monitoring, and real-time configuration.

A key aspect of holistic management is the complete coverage of all required disciplines. As the requirements for this depend heavily on the respective company and no tool (not even AixBOMS) can do everything, a good holistic solution includes its integration capability to and from third-party products. AixBOMS can also offer various options here, ranging from simple data integration (Integration Engine Light), which all modules support, to Integration Engine Enterprise, which is ETL-based for regular connection to external data pools, to our Development Suite, which also enables interface and functional integrations. The latter are particularly indispensable when transitioning from holistic management to holistic control.

 

The high level of integration of all modules and editors included in the suite allows for interdisciplinary planning and management, as well as holistic analyses and error detection for the management areas covered. Through the open interfaces and integration methods, these can also be extended to third-party products depending on the depth of integration. Nagios can be mentioned here as an example, whose monitoring consoles can be configured in AixBOMS using pre-defined templates.

 

Such a feature will become a significant requirement of future management software, considering the ongoing energy and climate monitoring using sensors and agents, and the increasing integration of smart sockets with the associated drastic increase in the volume of objects. Furthermore, the growing service orientation allows for solutions that manage services analogously to conventional IT infrastructures and bill them on a customer basis. Current topics such as virtualisation and IPv6 also present new challenges for existing DCIM environments. AixpertSoft has addressed these with its new developments and can already provide corresponding customer references. With this, we have once again demonstrated the good extensibility of AixBOMS.