For small businesses in Northern California and cities nationally, Progent's Microsoft-qualified consulting team provides network assistance and information technology consulting services for System Center Operations Manager and for the growing set of Application Management Packs that bring the benefits of Operations Manager to a broad array of mission-critical services. Progent can help you get the most from Microsoft Operations Manager by offering needs analysis, installation, configuration, customization, on-site and off-site network consulting and troubleshooting, Help Desk Call Center support, security consulting, and outsourcing for System Center Operations Manager 2007.

What Is MS Operations Manager?
Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007 is a next-generation network management solution that monitors the reliability, throughput, and safety of your information network by proactively identifying trouble and tendencies occurring on critical computers throughout your whole network.

MS Operations Manager operates by automatically examining event history from critical servers, then filtering, organizing, and analyzing these network events based on an extensive expert knowledge base. When MS Operations Manager detects trouble or a potentially damaging tendency, it can execute pre-programmed repair scripts or send alerts to notify designated IT people. For example, System Center Operations Manager could automatically take off line an infected server to prevent the spread of a discovered virus. Operations Manager also produces trend data so you can track the health of your information network and ensure that problem alerts have been satisfactorily addressed.

MS Operations Manager 2007 incorporates important improvements over Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 such as rich new reports and an easy to modify reporting environment, plus minimization of false alarms thanks to new self-tuning monitoring parameters that learn and adjust alerting behavior to the normal business usage patterns of programs and hardware. System Center Operations Manager 2007 also features new model-based management. By characterizing the IT environment as models, MS Operations Manager 2007 can better understand the interactions between the distributed software and components that make up your information technology services. These models, profiled in the System Definition Model that is the basis for the industry standard Services Modeling Language (SML), allow for more fine-grained discovery of service components and the power to track not only the servers but the whole end-to-end service as a unique object.

System Center Operations Manager Management Packs
Management Packs are the modular extensions which carry Operations Manager management features to OS platforms, programs and utilities, and other technology components. An Operations Manager Management Pack (MP) includes field-tested knowledge to discover, track, troubleshoot, chronicle, and resolve problems for a specific technology component. Management Packs contain health models based on the Systems Definition Model to analyze the efficiency, reliability, configuration and security data, plus the status of related components, to determine the general condition of components. Management Packs are available for Microsoft and third party OS platforms, software products, and devices.

Microsoft provides Operations Manager Management Packs for over 60 products and software components. Microsoft's Management Packs are produced by the identical teams who built the associated products so the experience and information incorporated is derived from the industry's most expert source. All Management Packs are offered for authorized users of Operations Manager 2007. Management Pack modules developed by Microsoft include:

  • Microsoft Windows 2008 Server
  • Microsoft Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2000
  • Microsoft Active Directory (AD)
  • MS Exchange Server 2007, Exchange 2003, Exchange 2000 Server
  • SQL Server 2005 and SQL Server 2000
  • Microsoft SPS Server
  • Microsoft Dynamics Customer Relationship Management 3.0 Server
  • Microsoft Application Virtualization
  • Microsoft Network Load Balancing
  • Windows Computer Cluster Server 2003
  • MS IIS 2003 and 2000
  • Host Integration Server (HIS)
  • Microsoft Internet Security and Acceleration (ISA) Server 2006 and ISA Server 2004
  • Microsoft Live Communications Server
  • Microsoft Systems Management Server (SMS)
  • MS .NET Framework
  • Windows XP for Desktops
  • Commerce Server
  • MS Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol Service
  • Microsoft Print Server
  • MS Windows Domain Name Server Service 2003
  • File Replication Services (FRS) 2003 and 2000
  • WINS 2003 and 2000
  • Windows Routing and Remote Access
  • SNA Server 4.0
  • MS Distributed Transaction Coordinator
  • MS Terminal Services
  • MS Transaction Server (MTS)
  • Microsoft Site Server
  • MS Application Center
  • Microsoft Proxy Server

    Third-party and Customized Microsoft Operations Manager 2007 Management Packs
    Microsoft Operations Manager 2007 Management Packs for many non-Microsoft software products including Linux, Oracle, and SAP, and for a range of server hardware, are produced and offered by Microsoft Partners. There are more than one hundred Microsoft Partner MPs covering the majority of technologies used by organizations today.

    Microsoft has published several tools creating or modifying MPs for System Center Operations Manager 2007. The Distributed Application Designer is a GUI-based tool for helping IT administrators to create performance models and Management Packs for their information technology Services. The Management Pack Authoring Console is a GUI-based tool designed to assist network administrators and programmers to build Management Packs for their custom business programs and other network components. The Operations Manager 2007 Software Development Kit (SDK) contains software APIs so developers can more deeply integrate with and regulate MS Operations Manager 2007.

    Benefits of Microsoft System Center Operations Manager
    Operations Manager 2007 improves the reliability of business-critical servers by automatically identifying and helping to fix trouble spots before they are able to bring down a computer. For an example of how Microsoft Operations Manager has benefited a Northern California company, go to the Microsoft Operations Manager Case Study.

    Microsoft Operations Manager can optimize system throughput by checking predefined performance thresholds and usage patterns on critical servers, enabling IT support personnel to be more proactive in adding performance-related resources and to eliminate issues before they result in severe system bottlenecks.

    Microsoft Operations Manager reduces IT staffing expenses by simplifying the procedures of system management. Because Microsoft Operations Manager can efficiently filter and organize enormous amounts of information gathered from many servers, fewer network managers are needed to take care of IT operations. In addition, the capability of MS Operations Manager to perform automatically in response to alarms makes it feasible to create expert scripts that can take complex corrective steps which would ordinarily require the hands-on support of IT staff.

    By automatically generating alarms and sending them via e-mail or wireless pagers to designated IT personnel, Microsoft Operations Manager makes it simpler for IT groups to maintain service level agreements. Microsoft Operations Manager's Knowledge Base helps resolve trouble more quickly, and Microsoft Operations Manager's reports ensure that job tickets don't get ignored. Automatic 24x7 monitoring and alarm transmission also allows companies to allocate their IT group more effectively so that more work can be accomplished without sacrificing system support.

    In general, Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007 offers small companies the advantages of 24x7 network monitoring plus expertise in troubleshooting without having to pay for a big, in-house service staff.

    How Progent Can Help You Get the Most from System Center Operations Manager
    Setting up Microsoft Operations Manager's, sophisticated monitoring platform can be a difficult. With more than five years of experience with the NetIQ product upon which Operations Manager is built, Progent's IT support engineers can assist you to select the most sensible Microsoft Operations Manager features, install and configure System Center Operations Manager, and write specialized rules, procedures, analytics, and alerts for your enterprise. Progent can also document System Center Operations Manager's application monitoring rules and protocols.

    For network issues detected by Operations Manager, you can outsource problem response to Progent's Microsoft-certified consulting team. With years of IT support background, these IT professionals possess the know-how to respond efficiently to the information produced by System Center Operations Manager to keep business-critical systems running steadily. By examining trend data and responding appropriately to alerts, Progent can resolve emerging issues before they result in system failure and fix critical problems as soon as they appear. In most cases, Progent can handle problems remotely, conserving time and money. For severe trouble requiring on-premise service, Progent can quickly dispatch a field engineer to the location of any small or medium-size business in Northern California or in major cities throughout the U.S..

    Progent's large staff of consulting professionals makes it possible, if required, to escalate tough problems by tapping the talents to some of the San Francisco Bay Area's most experienced network consultants.

    To learn additional information about Operations Manager and how Progent can enable your small business achieve enterprise-class network management by deploying this revolutionary platform, select one of these links:

    If you wish to get in touch with Progent about professional help for Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007, call 1-800-993-9400 or e-mail operations-manager-help@progent.com.















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