White PapersIT organizations are facing increasing pressure to deliver excellence with fewer resources. As the IT workforce is challenged to maintain service levels, more often than not, strategic tasks give way to the immediate demands of day-to-day troubleshooting. Availability and security must remain the top priority since data breaches and downtime directly impact revenue, customer confidence, and employee productivity. To free resources for long-range planning and innovation, IT groups must find more efficient ways to keep the business running.
Time and again, experts have shown that leveraging a single view of the health and security of the IT infrastructure contributes significantly to IT efficiency. Real-time monitoring of critical systems ensures IT managers can prevent or respond to issues quickly. An aggregated view of the data assists IT in minimizing the challenges of cross-departmental communication. The data that is captured also feeds long-range strategic planning and compliance monitoring. However, many comprehensive monitoring systems use costly proprietary code that requires a specialist to install and manage. The benefits are clear, but the return on investment may take years to realize.
AbstractA single view into the health and security of the IT infrastructure is essential to creating IT efficiency. However, true comprehensive monitoring is inaccessible to many IT organizations due to the labor required to create it manually or the cost of proprietary automation systems. FireScope provides an open source based solution that pays for itself in just months by automating data collection and analysis, enabling more efficient use of existing resources.Realizing ROI from a Comprehensive Monitoring SolutionDecember 26, 2006Untitled Documentwww.FireScope.com 877.780.FIRE (3473) info@FireScope.comRealizing ROI from a Comprehensive Monitoring SolutionAbstractA single view into the health and security of the IT infrastructure is essential to creating IT efficiency. However, true comprehensive monitoring is inaccessible to many IT organizations due to the labor required to create it manually or the cost of proprietary automation systems. FireScope provides an open source based solution that pays for itself in just months by automating data collection and analysis, enabling more efficient use of existing resources.Executive SummaryIT organizations are facing increasing pressure to deliver excellence with fewer resources. As the IT workforce is challenged to maintain service levels, more often than not, strategic tasks give way to the immediate demands of day-to-day troubleshooting. Availability and security must remain the top priority since data breaches and downtime directly impact revenue, customer confidence, and employee productivity. To free resources for long-range planning and innovation, IT groups must find more efficient ways to keep the business running.Time and again, experts have shown that leveraging a single view of the health and security of the IT infrastructure contributes significantly to IT efficiency. Real-time monitoring of critical systems ensures IT managers can prevent or respond to issues quickly. An aggregated view of the data assists IT in minimizing the challenges of cross-departmental communication. The data that is captured also feeds long-range strategic planning and compliance monitoring. However, many comprehensive monitoring systems use costly proprietary code that requires a specialist to install and manage. The benefits are clear, but the return on investment may take years to realize.The FireScope appliance and application make complete, real time, end-to-end monitoring of your IT operations accessible, with an ROI that can be calculated in just months. Built on open source code, FireScope costs far less than proprietary code and can be implemented without a specialist. For a fraction of the cost of one burdened headcount, Firestone can improve efficiency by 35%-65%, enabling IT to focus resources on priority areas.The Price of PartnershipDelivering business-critical technology is Job One in any IT organization. Demonstrating that e-commerce sites and enterprise applications are performing to service level agreements (SLAs) and that the environment is secure against threats or attacks is essential. As a strategic partner within the enterprise, IT must also contribute sound, data-based long range plans that anticipate future technology demands. Leading organizations are also looking to increase their value by contributing to sales calls, innovating, speeding development, and improving skills through training. Performing at the level of a strategic partner requires insight across systems. Data is paramount to ensuring systems are performing at expected levels and in communicating convincingly with senior managers. But the manual labor required to gather, translate, and share gigabytes of log files across departments takes resources. How can IT consider strategic planning and innovation when resources are pressed to ensure SLAs, security, and compliance are sound? They must find efficiency. IT must fnd ways to automate manual data gathering and reporting so that skilled resources can spend their time taking action. Several systems exist for automating end-to-end monitoring of the IT infrastructure. Most have price tags in six figures, take months to deploy, and require another specialist be hired to manage them. The return takes years to realize, assuming the organization is not too hindered by vendor lock-in. FireScope Realizing ReturnFireScope delivers a single view into the health and security of the IT infrastructure with a return that can be realized in just months. Built on open source code, the initial cost of FireScope is a fraction of the cost of a single headcount, yet it delivers labor savings of 35-65% in data collection, analysis, and reporting tasks. Reducing downtime and maximizing efficiency both translate into ROI as well as the freedom to focus resources on priorities that require their technical skills.Untitled Documentwww.FireScope.com 877.780.FIRE (3473) info@FireScope.comRealizing ROI from a Comprehensive Monitoring SolutionImprove Performance, Impact RevenueServer downtime costs money. Whether it s employee productivity or customers abandoning e-commerce sites, slow or unavailable servers impact revenue. IT managers need to monitor the pulse of the entire infrastructure, end-to-end, to be able to prevent issues or enact immediate Incident Response. Leading research firms including Gartner Group, Giga, AMR, and The Yankee Group have estimated that end-to-end performance management reduces annual downtime by 25-50%. The question isn t whether leading IT organizations need to monitor and manage, it s how they can monitor and manage without overburdening an already strained workforce.Availability Impact Revenue Systems10 Hours of unplanned downtime on just 15 servers can cost 750,000 annually in customer transactionsBusiness Productivity Systems4 Hours of unplanned downtime on 75 servers can result in a 555,000 employee productivity impactIncident and Problem ResolutionRoot cause analysis on 10 incidents per month totals 18,000 in labor each year15% reduction in downtime gained throughend-to-end monitoring and managementcan create a revenue and labor benefit of 160,000 annually How many personnel collect data from disparate servers and applications across the infrastructure? How many cross-team meetings are held to translate the data and identify a root cause? Manually managing multiple monitoring systems is a resource drain that costs countless man-hours. In reality, few organizations have the time or resources to adequately monitor and manage all their systems, degrading the effectiveness of these point solutions. FireScope earns its return quickly by performing the heavy labor collecting and analyzing data from your existing systems including e-commerce sites, enterprise applications, servers, networks, and other business critical systems. It then presents the data visually, through charts, graphs, and tables so IT managers can quickly identify trends and related events. Updated in real time using AJAX, users can monitor a single dashboard into all critical systems, helping them proactively resolve issues before users are impacted.FireScope enables IT to enact end-to-end monitoring and management with 35% less labor, helping organizations capture the 25-50% reduction in downtime that drives additional productivity and customer transaction benefits. Prevent Corporate Security LossesThe average cost of a customer data breach weighs in at 4.8 million per incident.1 In 2006, the number of U.S. companies reporting compromised records nearly doubled.2 The rapidly growing cyber-crime industry is driving billions in losses by utilizing new malicious code that enters via unconventional means. Single-point solutions and perimeter monitoring alone cannot detect these slower replicating, stealth approaches. IT must monitor the overall environment, setting a baseline and watching for anomalies that reveal malicious attacks. However, IT security specialists are distracted by helpdesk issues, regulatory requirements, and other non-specialist tasks. The time they spend analyzing security issues and monitoring the security environment must be highly efficient, or the enterprise is at risk. FireScope has been shown to reduce the labor required to collect and analyze security data from multiple point solutions by 35%. Security events happen by the thousands each year; so FireScope wades through gigabytes of log files, analyzing and projecting trends instantly. Viewing aggregated results, your security specialists can spend their time more efficiently, staying in front of threats that can cost the company revenue, lost productivity, or customer confidence.Untitled Documentwww.FireScope.com 877.780.FIRE (3473) info@FireScope.comRealizing ROI from a Comprehensive Monitoring SolutionRefocus ResourcesUse FireScope to reduce the labor for these tasks by about 35-65%: Collecting and analyzing gigabytes of log files Monitoring performance, security and availability metrics Conducting capacity, budget, and ROI analyses Translating data from multiple solutions into a common language Performing root cause analysis, troubleshooting and remediation Reporting compliance postureImprove Efficiency in Daily Operations and Strategic Planning Budget analysis, reporting performance against SLAs, capacity planning, server virtualization they all require copious amounts of time to collect, translate, and analyze data. To perform as a strategic contributor and to manage budgets effectively, IT organizations must have the numbers. Communicating convincingly with senior management requires sound, data-driven strategic plans. FireScope retains a repository of data on the performance of the entire infrastructure, enabling data modeling in a visual, easy-to-read format. By reducing the manual portion of daily maintenance and strategic planning by about 35%, FireScope enables skilled headcount to spend their time projecting scenarios instead of pulling data. They can use a built-in Virtualization Analyzer to identify the best combinations of hardware and software to maximize server capacity and assist in server consolidation. They can detect whether the best return on investment is a memory upgrade, a server purchase or a move to virtualization. They can project future capacity needs to efficiently time upgrades. And they can do it all from an easily customizable Web interface.Facilitate ComplianceReporting compliance with regulations such as the Sarbanes-Oxley, HIPAA, and Computer Fraud and Abuse Acts can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars in labor each year. Audit preparation alone costs tens of thousands. An IT Policy Compliance Group study reports that automating IT security functions and increasing the frequent of audits improved compliance more than hiring consultants or services. FireScope collects the data needed from multiple security solutions and servers every day. It reduces the labor needed to monitor compliance posture and prepare for audits by 65%, which means it returns its investment in a fraction of a year. Choose EfficiencyFireScope creates a single, comprehensive view of availability, performance, and security data across the infrastructure. The service-oriented architecture and AJAX integration mean IT managers see customized information, updated in real time, leading to faster Incident Response. The appliance also reports the business intelligence IT managers need to plan strategically and monitor compliance, all at a fraction of the cost of hiring additional staff.Built on open source code, FireScope costs far less than proprietary systems. Across the world, thousands of developers are actively engaged in improving each of the open source components of FireScope. This ensures that FireScope is on the leading edge of technology, particularly the most current security advancements. With open source, FireScope works across platforms and can be installed and upgraded easily, without the services of a specialist. Deployment takes a few days, compared to months for proprietary systems. And, it works across virtually all your existing systems, providing an integrated view unmatched by internally-built applications. Additionally, this same open source nature also provides organizations with flexibility to extend the capabilities of FireScope to support proprietary applications or introduce new functionality based on their unique needs.Untitled Documentwww.FireScope.com 877.780.FIRE (3473) info@FireScope.comRealizing ROI from a Comprehensive Monitoring SolutionConclusion IT organizations are working with limited resources. Not only must they deliver performance and availability at service level agreements, they must find new ways to do it efficiently so that time can be spent on other priorities like innovation, training, development speed, and revenue support. FireScope leverages open source code to provide end-to-end monitoring and management of the health and security of the IT infrastructure at an upfront cost that is a fraction of proprietary systems. For about half of the cost of one burdened headcount, FireScope reduces labor requirements for many monitoring, management, and compliance, data-intense tasks by 35-65%. With labor costs in the hundreds of thousands and security risks in the millions, the ROI for FireScope can be realized in months. The benefits will be obvious from day one.For more information about how FireScope can benefit your organization, visit us on the web at http://www.firescope.com1 2006 Ponemon Institute Benchmark Study2 Informationweek Global Security Survey 2006 Copyright 2006 FireScope, Inc.Cisco PIX FirewallISS ProventiaApplianceAirTightSpectraGuardIBM TivoliNessusScannerOther 3rd PartyPoint SolutionsAnti-VirusSolutionHPOpenviewSpyware / Spam FilteringSolutionFireScopeHOMEAVAILABILITYPERFORMANCESECURITYREPORTSALERTSTOOLSAdmin ToolsConfiguration GroupsConfiguration ItemsRecent ViewsSaved ReportsGroup Status OverviewInfrastructure Events by SeverityGroupAPSCIP Audit 2006Capacity Planning Q406Weekly Security TPS ReportExecutive Summary ReportSystem Alerts OverviewRecent AlertsSUN_LON_DB01SUN_NYC_DB01SUN_SEA_DB01RHL_NYC_WB01WIN_NYC_WB01WIN_BERLIN_DC01WIN_SEA_FS01HUX_NYC_AP01HUX_NYC_AP02HUX_LON_AP01NYC_DTACTRSEATTLE_DTACTRLONDON_DTACTRBERLIN_DTACTRAdd newView all / Edit Add newView all / Edit CRITMAJMINWARNINFOERRTOTAL002251221042212110130127321411120321331241321112001030421201281142301101442112101424172124110Total101424172124Total = 110CRITMAJMINWARNINFOERRTimeSevDescription2006.Sep.26 10:18:38 WIN_LON_WB01 has just been restarted2006.Sep.25 14:30:01 Version of firescope_agent(d) was changed on WIN_LON_WB012006.Sep.25 14:30:00 Host information was changed on WIN_LON_WB012006.Sep.25 14:10:00 c:autoexec.bat has been changed on server WIN_LON_WB012006.Sep.25 14:09:10 Lack of free memory on server WIN_LON_WB012006.Sep.25 14:09:10 Too many processes on WIN_LON_WB012006.Sep.25 14:09:10 Processor load is too high on WIN_LON_WB012006.Sep.25 14:09:10 Lack of free swap space on WIN_LON_WB012006.Sep.25 14:09:10 WIN_LON_WB01 has just been restarted2006.Sep.25 14:09:10 Low free disk space (0000MB) on WIN_LON_WB01's volume c:Security > LONDON_DTACTR > HUX_LON_AP01Availability > NYC_DTACTR > WIN_NYC_WB01Performance> SEATTLE_DTACTR > WIN_SEA_FS01Welcome Steve CottonHome - My Account -Sign Out - Add Content -Page Settings
