FCAPS

Next pass on Data Center Automation “Blueprint”

Thanks for the feedback, I’ve incorporated some points that have been made into an updated version of the Data Center Automation Blueprint (DCAB).

As mentioned previous this is a work in progress and I love getting feedback, ideas, concerns etc. with the model. As mentioned previously I’m trying to build a functional model (at the 30,000 foot level) that represents key software functionality to automate the data center towards someday becoming “lights out.”

Also, with that said, it needs to be comprehensive but not overwhelming. I want to keep the yellow DCA functional areas limited in number…if this grows to be much more then the current six I feel it becomes too complex. So to add any new areas I need to assess how do they compare to the current areas and could I combine any areas.

One I’m struggling with right now is I’ve received feedback that analytics itself is an area. The interesting thing is analytics currently fits to some degree within each of the 4 horizontal functional areas (e.g., Configuration/Change, Security/Protection) as each of those products offer advanced reporting and as that progresses they do predictive reporting and analytics around that functional area.

Analytics would also show up at the dashboard level (currently beyond the scope of what I’m defining as the functional areas of the Data Center Automation Blueprint) where you would correlate business intelligence, patterns etc. across not just Data Center Automation functional categories but also across manual task orchestration (e.g., service/help desk) details.

Thoughts?

One more thing to clear up, I know some (many) of these functional categories and their products extend beyond the Data Center. The lens this blog looks through is exclusively focused on the challenges posed by large, complex data centers. For example, I know performance products are also useful in all sized companies (big & small) and also beyond the data center (e.g., headquarters, remote offices, partner networks, etc).

Reference model build out, take two

So a quick continuation note on my recent post related to pulling together a reference model for automating our data centers.  Once I get the Data Center Infrastructure categories set it’s going to be very important to build out the actual Data Center Automation categories.  In the previous post I mentioned Performance, Fault, Configuration & Security - which functionally are part of a now defunct reference model initiated many moons ago.  My friend Glen O’Donnell recently wrote about this on his blog R.I.P. FCAPS.  He is a proponent of ITIL as the replacement for that.  I’m familiar with and have worked with ITIL previously, so let’s take a quick look at what it may add to my Data Center automation categories.

There are 11 functional domains that are core to ITIL, here is a link that describes each of the below items in detail.

1. Service Level Management
2.  Capacity Management
3. Contingency Planning
4. Availability Management
5. IT Financial Management
6. Configuration Management
7. Problem Management
8. Incident Management
9. Change Management
10. Service / Help Desk
11. Release Management

Reviewing these areas points out a major hole I missed in my first post on this topic.  A CMDB - no matter what you call it (e.g, IT Asset Management, Inventory) is an automated, up-to-date, capability to have a fresh view of all IT assets and their relationships.  Not only is it needed to make decisions but also is a core component of course for configuring your Fault, Performance, Configuration & Security automation solutions.

Another area I need to put more thought into is if/how to incorporate the people/process side of things (e.g., Help Desk/Ticketing).  My desire for this model is what it would take to approach the utopia of “lights out” data centers through automation.

Next time on this topic I’ll tackle the above questions and also look at eTOM from TMN (another model I’ve worked with previously).  But that will have to wait till next week.  Here is a quick note I came across on the internet that compares eTOM to ITIL.