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The top mobile apps for your IT toolkit
Why should users have all the fun with the hot mobile devices du jour? The truth is that IT can join the iPad, iPhone, and Android party and be able to work on the go just as easily as their business colleagues. When we surveyed IT pros as to how they use mobile devices to manage the data centre and troubleshoot support issues, 16 tools kept coming up as favourites. Most run on iOS (both iPhone and iPad, unless otherwise noted), but many also run on Android, and a few are available for other platforms as well. Even better, many are free.
CrashPlan Pro
Secure file access is often critical for IT staff, given that many IT documents could provide an outsider some of the keys to the virtual kingdom. Code 42 Software's CrashPlan Pro provides secure file access to such files stored on its Pro Cloud service.
Price: Free
Supported platforms: iOS, Android, Windows Phone
Bomgar and Bongar Representative Console
If you use Bomgar's support tools, use the Bomgar client to chat, share the browser screen, and take screenshots of users' iOS devices to help troubleshoot them. The Representative Console app does the same for Windows clients.
Price: Free
Supported clients: iOS
Citrix Receiver
If you're a Citrix shop, access Windows virtual desktops from your mobile device. You can run not only Windows desktops, but also Windows Server desktops.
Price: Free
Supported clients: iOS, Android
AccessToGo
If you're not a Citrix shop, there are plenty of VNC and
RDP tools out there, but several IT pros called out Ericom Software's AccessToGo, wihch provides a free RDP client for inside the firewall. To use it outside the firewall, you'll need Ericom's server client.
Price: Free
Supported clients: iOS, Android
jNag
If you use the Nagios IT monitoring tools, monitor from your iPad, iPhone, or Android device with this unofficial tool. (Note that you'll need a free server plug-in to use it.)
Price: Free
Supported clients: iOS, Android
TouchMon
Another option for mobile Nagios monitoring is S-Team IT Solutions' TouchMon client.
Price: £3.75
Supported clients: Android
Decaf EC2 Client
As more and more companies use public cloud services, IT will want to monitor their performance. This client provides details on average CPU performance, total disk reads and writes, and total incoming/outgoing network traffic for Amazon.com EC2 servers.
Price: £8.77
Supported clients: iPhone, Android
vSphere Client
If you're managing a VMware vSphere environment, this iPad client lets you monitor the performance of vSphere hosts and virtual machines; start, stop, and suspend VMs; reboot them; or put them into maintenance mode.
Price: Free
Supported clients: iPad
iVMControl
Another option for managing VMware environments is
Project Eureka's iVMControl client, which some IT pros prefer over VMware's own tools. (One reason is that it is not restricted to just iPads, as VMware's client is.)
Price: £9.44
Supported clients: iOS, Android
AD HelpDesk
Active Directory is another common environment that needs managing whether or not you're in the data centre. John Bowers' AD HelpDesk gives you that access when on the go.
Price: $7.99
Supported clients: iOS
ActiveDir Manager
If you don't use iOS but want mobile management of Active Directory, look no further than BealSystems' ActiveDir Manager.
Price: £3.49
Supported clients: Android
Codepacity Network Utility
Codepacity's Network Utility is a simple but very handy tool for checking connectivity via ping, TCP/IP port scans, GeoIP lookup, and gathering IP address information.
Price: Free
Supported clients: iPhone
IBM XIV Mobile Dashboard
If you use IBM's XIV's storage systems, use the appropriate version of this app to monitor them (there's no unversal iOS client as yet).
Price: Free
Supported clients: iPhone, iPad
VoxCloud
If you use Voxel's cloud-provisioned servers, use this app to manage and monitor them.
Price: Free
Supported clients: iOS, Android
Jump Desktop
There are lots of VNC and RDP clients out there, but we heard Jump Desktop recommended several times. It supports both VNC and RDP for Windows, OS X, and Linux PCs.
Price: £4.99
Supported clients: iOS, Android
OnPage
You don't have to carry a separate pager if you subscribe to Onset Technologies' OnPage service. Instead, its client turns your smartphone into a pager.
Price: Free
Supported clients: iPhone, BlackBerry
vSphere Client
If you're managing a VMware vSphere environment, this iPad client lets you monitor the performance of vSphere hosts and virtual machines; start, stop, and suspend VMs; reboot them; or put them into maintenance mode.
Price: Free
Supported clients: iPad
