FINAL WORD
Herman Chan , President , Sunbird Software
objects to align IT with the business throughout the product or service delivery lifecycle . In comparison , Data Center CMDBs track the physical infrastructure relied upon by IT systems and enable agility through real-time capacity and change management to optimize the availability , utilization and efficiency of the data center infrastructure to meet the demands of IT .
Further , a Data Center CMDB allows you to visually track and manage information in a manner that is simply not possible with a traditional IT CMDB .
A Data Center CMDB can be leveraged to provide rich 3D models of the physical infrastructure with detailed asset information such as cabinet and U position , port information and dimensions , while a traditional IT CMDB is just a database of fields .
With a traditional IT CMDB , it is impossible to remotely visualize your devices and their physical connections and relationships .
Cutting-edge data center teams have realized the enormous benefit of leveraging and integrating both types of CMDBs to drive automation that saves time and improves data accuracy . With a vendor-agnostic data center management platform that is open and interoperable , integration is fast and easy to accomplish . A modern Data Center CMDB will work with what you have and come out of the box with open APIs and userconfigurable connectors that simplify integration .
Through one seamless portal , you can integrate CMDBs and facilitate flow-through operations that enable you to create , read , update and delete assets or attributes through other systems .
For example , if you add a new server in your IT CMDB such as ServiceNow , Cherwell , Jira , or BMC , that server will automatically be created in your Data Center CMDB and vice versa .
By integrating CMDBs and enabling automation , your teams will :
• Enable a single source of truth . Integration breaks down information silos and increases the accuracy of all data so users of either system can trust that the additional data they have access to is accurate and up-to-date .
• Improve workflow and productivity . Integration allows information entered in one system to be automatically pushed to the other , saving you time by not having to update multiple systems or crosscheck data against other sources .
• Enhance collaboration across functional teams . One holistic picture of all available data enables datadriven collaboration and decision-making across all data center , facilities and IT teams .
• Simplify data center security management . Maintenance of user permissions is simplified to ensure that security policies are adhered to . As some users may only need to access one CMDB , they can still see all the relevant data they need .
Bringing it all together
Key benefits of integrating traditional IT and Data Center CMDBs
Both traditional IT CMDBs and Data Center CMDBs are important and necessary in the age of digitization , but technologies used in a data center are interdependent and as such they must be integrated to extract the most value from them .
According to Forrester , 93 % of companies agree that innovative technologies are necessary for companies to reach their Digital Transformation goals . The state of data center infrastructure management today is one in which automation via integration is required to be successful .
Leading data center teams have found that deploying and integrating both traditional IT CMDBs and Data Center CMDBs have allowed them to maximize the value of their data by enabling data-driven collaboration and decision-making to provide the foundation modern businesses need to be agile , innovate and thrive . p
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