Enterprise Change and Configuration Management

IT Managers Story!

The phone rings! It’s someone at a remote site (isn’t it always a ‘remote site!’). “We’ve got all kinds of problems here” the user casually informs you “is there a problem with the Network?” he asks? (why does the network always get the blame you think to yourself?)

Now the fun begins. Where to start? OK – Network looks fine…Applications seem to be performing…Servers are all reporting good health?

Ahh - Here we go again…this could be a long night!

Scenario Two (Or to put it another way - How to deal with ‘Mr. Is the Network Slow?’ from here on in)

The phone rings. “We’ve got problems”. You say – “Aha – in fact no you don’t…everything will be fine trust me, for I am an IT Guy! Quite simply something somewhere has changed is all…hang on and let me see what!” Or words to that effect!

You then go to your NNT Change Tracker console and query– What changed at “Mr. The Network is slow” site since everything was last reporting fine?

Change Tracker dutifully informs you that someone altered the Firewall settings at that site around about the time the problems first became apparent! You consult the persons concerned (you first of all want to know why a change request was not issued – ‘tut tut!’). It becomes apparent that vital traffic is being blocked. You hit the ‘revert button’ and automatically the last ‘known and compliant’ settings for the Firewall are restored through NNT Change Tracker and ‘voila’ all is good again. You phone the user…you smile quietly and think about reminding everyone in your team of the value of proper change management and control!

The End.

NNT - Change Tracker Enterprise provides a comprehensive and easy to use solution for managing the Discovery, Health, Availability, Performance, Compliance, Configuration and Changes across your entire IT Infrastructure. This includes: Network Devices, Workstations, Servers, Firewalls, Applications, Directories and any other Configurable Items (CI’s) important in the delivery of IT services.

If any of the following questions resonate with you...read on!

Health: Are my systems healthy at all times? Are any running low on capacity and if so where? Do any of my devices have unknown processes, services or other malware running that may impact delivery of IT services? In fact how can I be absolutely certain that every device is running as it should?
Availability: Are my systems available and responding?
Performance: What sort of response times am I getting between users and key application servers or devices that depend on each other? Is the performance within a specified, known and preferred baseline?
Users: Are all our user workstations in good shape? How do I know whether or not these machines are compromised somehow? Our users may complain that the network is slow but perhaps it’s the PC that is sick...how would we know?
Compliance: Are my systems compliant? Either with external or internal legislative governance? If they aren’t, which ones are not and specifically why not or what aspect is non-compliant?
Configuration: How are my devices configured? Are these configurations safely backed up? Are they configured as I expect? Are the configurations compliant? Can I run a bulk re-configuration of multiple devices through a single GUI if I need to make a global change?
Changes: Who’s changing what, when and where across my infrastructure? Can I immediately identify who, what, where and when if an unauthorised change occurs? Do I have adequate Change Management process in place? Can I ensure that those making changes are actually authorized to do so?
Asset Management: What devices are attached to my network? What software and what versions have I got running on my machines?

If you can’t immediately lay your hands on the information that would provide these answers then NNT Change Tracker might be worth a look.

NNT-Change Tracker Enterprise provides a Web Based Dashboard and or Console view of all of these crucial metrics and provides answers to all these questions and more.

The value:

Immediate identification of problems when they occur: If a problem occurs within your IT infrastructure, something has changed. Identify what changed and you identify the root cause of the problem.
Quick restoration of service: Having the configuration of every single device safely backed up means that ‘no matter what’ you can always quickly revert to a ‘known, working and compliant state’ for all your IT systems.
Easy Audits: Auditors will likely pass anyone who can provide evidence of proper change and configuration management of their IT systems.
Security: Analysts estimate that as much as 98% of the threat to IT systems is the result of poorly or incorrectly configured items. NNT audits all configurations to ensure there are no errors or vulnerabilities.
Easy Compliance: NNT’s Compliance Engine audits every single device and compares the status and configuration of each device to the prevailing compliance requirement.
Out of the box Compliance: Most external legislative requirements are provided including PCI DSS, HIPPA, SOX & Coco. For a full list click here
Integration with Event and Incident Management systems for complete ITIL oriented IT management
Peace of mind: NNT has you covered - whatever gets thrown your way.

Our mission is simple: To build easy to use, fully featured and affordable solutions that make the life of the IT professional easier! In doing so, he or she will be better able to provide reliable IT services, fix problems quicker and continue to build and develop world class IT infrastructures that enable businesses and organizations to succeed.

The NNT flagship product, Change Tracker Enterprise™, used in conjunction with the NNT Angel ™ range of desktop and server monitoring agents, fully support your move towards ITIL™ Service Delivery Management, allowing you to implement and audit a baseline for the critical factors that will determine your ability to deliver quality, cost effective and reliable IT Services to your users and meet Auditor requirements.

The NNT methodology for change and configuration management can be defined as follows

Define configuration policy – Get configurations into a known, compliant and trusted state
Monitor changes to configuration and performance metrics that may affect compliance with both your internal Configuration Management Policy and external Corporate Governance Policies
Audit all changes and reconcile these with your Service Desk or Change Management system as part of your change and configuration process
Clearly identify any breach of compliance
Quickly identify & remediate unauthorized changes to return systems to the last known, compliant and working state

“If a problem occurs within your Enterprise, something has changed. Identify what has changed and you have identified the root cause of the problem”