Systems Management — Standardizing the Managed Node

The Dell™ Unified Manageability Architecture breaks down proprietary and monolithic architectures into a layered, standards-based approach. This enables network resources, such as servers and storage systems equipped with standards-based instrumentation, to interface seamlessly with any standards-based management tool or console.

To help move the industry forward, Dell focuses on standardizing the management instrumentation (or agents) on managed nodes such as servers, storage, switches, client systems and printers. Standardizing the managed node will allow third-party, standards-based management tools to replace current proprietary vendor tools. In this way, Dell will help to create the ecosystem that enables true open systems management.

Unified Manageability Architecture

The Dell Unified Manageability Architecture is based on existing and emerging standards established by global standards bodies, such as the Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF) and the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA). Adhering to the guiding principles of scalability, flexibility, rapid integration, open interfaces and support for a wide range of devices, this architecture is a blueprint to simplify operations, improve resource utilization and efficiently scale out to thousands of nodes.

The layered architecture is depicted here. Four of the six layers — physical, logical mapping, aggregation and access — address aspects of the managed node and device-level management instrumentation. The other two layers — resource management and orchestration — consist of management solutions such as Dell OpenManage ™ and Microsoft® System Center. These software components work together to support the increasingly automated hosting of physical and virtual workloads, thus enabling dynamic data center architectures such as those required for cloud computing. This layered organization is designed to help the IT industry standardize terminology, isolate functionality and interfaces, and address the various aspects of systems management in a consistent manner.

Pivotal Standards

One of the most important standards enabling the new managed node architecture is the Common Information Model (CIM). CIM standardizes the data model used to describe (or map) the IT environment for management purposes. In much the same way that mapping the constellations provided a standard frame of reference for early sailors to navigate the seas, CIM provides a standard frame of reference for IT administrators to manage network resources. Dell also promotes the following standards:

• Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) — Standard interface for configuring server hardware before the operating system has been loaded
• Intelligent Platform Management Interface (IPMI) — Standard interface for server management and remote access capabilities
• Systems Management Architecture for Server Hardware (SMASH) — Suite of specifications that standardizes command line interface scripts
• Storage Management Initiative Specification (SMI-S) — Specifications that enables standards-based storage management
• Systems Management BIOS (SMBIOS) — Specifications that standardizes hardware configuration information
• WS-Management — Web services specification that standardizes the language and mechanisms used by managed devices and applications to share management information about their products and services. Based on the Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP), WS-Management was announced in October 2004 by AMD, Dell, Intel, Microsoft and Sun

These and other emerging standards promoted by Dell promise to transform today's proprietary systems management environment.

True Open Systems Management

Dell engineering teams and Dell partners are already mapping technologies onto the Unified Manageability Architecture blueprint to help simplify manageability. Their goal is to make standards-based management infrastructure native to the platform, rather than something that is grafted on after the fact.

Dell's approach to systems management architecture is to help create well-defined, widely accepted standards that promote interoperability and flexibility in customer computing environments. In this way, Dell intends to provide true open systems management by galvanizing the industry around a common set of management standards.