[ale] Hardware monitoring

[Jim Popovitch]

Christopher Fowler wrote:
> NetCool does this right?  Does it install an agent on each server?

Yes, Netcool does this, and Yes it involves a local agent.  Specifically 
it is the Netcool/SSMs (System & Service Monitors).  There is also SSM 
Ops (or whatever name they are calling it these days) which is the 
centralized operations server (accessed via a webbrowser) that is used 
to centrally manage all the distributed agents.  These agents can 
co-exist or replace the native SNMP agent on the host, and they can 
provide similar functionality as an SNMP agent would (i.e. you can poll 
the SSM agent with snmpget/walk/set/etc.)  The Netcool/SSMs are very 
powerful agents that can do a host of things,

Micromuse, the Netcool company, was recently acquired by IBM.  Google 
for "Netcool/SSM" for more info.  You can email me privately if you want 
more info, I don't work on the sales team. ;-)

-Jim P.