How Infrastructure Monitoring Can Support Your Digital Transformation Journey

Cloud deployments have overtaken that of on-premises in the enterprise application software market since 2020, and Gartner expects they will be double the size of on-premises by 2025. 

These changes reflect the fast evolution in IT infrastructure due to new technology, business models, and market demands. The movement toward cloud, mobility, and IoT continues to surge forward. But with these changes comes complexity, as most enterprises grapple with a mix of legacy on-premises systems and new cloud-based ones. 

Many enterprises find they need to continue with some legacy systems as they incrementally move toward the cloud; others find they will likely continue to be hybrid for years to come. Their challenge: how to gain a complete view of their on-premises and cloud infrastructure as it evolves. 

Accelerated change adds to the complexity

As we continue to see massive changes, the concept of what comprises the cloud is likely to evolve in the next few years. Over the next decade, the cloud will become more structured and controlled, yet far more nuanced, having most likely traveled through the crucible of the current set of underlying issues that have begun to accumulate and gain our attention. 

Up until now, cloud computing has seen development and adoption of the public/private cloud, SaaS, and hybrid cloud, and is moving towards the adoption of EDGE computing, serverless functions, multi-cloud, and IoT. Going forward we are likely going to see change and evolution accelerating towards the metaverse, industry-specific clouds, cloud coalitions, cloud/EDGE brokers, and sustainable clouds. 

Figure 1: Accelerated change adds to the complexity.

How can IT manage these changes? 

With ongoing digital transformation projects, ITOps teams now need to manage the complex infrastructure stack supporting the organization’s business services. Today’s data center is a mix of traditional infra components and modern cloud assets working to deliver the digital experience. To manage this complexity, enterprises need infrastructure observability that unifies the management of legacy and modern computer systems in a data center.

Gain a single pane of glass

Infrastructure observability is created by integrating specialized tools like DX Unified Infrastructure Management (DX UIM) with AIOps (Artificial Intelligence for IT Operations) to provide a unified way to manage legacy and modern infrastructures. It provides a “single pane of glass” view

DX UIM with AIOps delivers an end-to-end view of all applications, regardless of where they reside. Unlike modern monitoring tools that are built specifically to monitor a modern tech stack, a robust AIOps solution like Broadcom’s encapsulating specialized ITIM tool DX UIM is able to span both legacy and modern infrastructures. 

Multiple monitoring solutions are available. When looking for one that delivers a single pane of glass view into legacy and modern infrastructure, you should look for the following features: 

• Full-stack infrastructure observability across app-infra-network, including cloud infrastructure and networks
• Monitors service levels across private and public clouds. Ability to define service level objectives (SLO) based on quality of service (QoS) parameters, and service level agreements (SLA) based on SLO
• Quicker time to value with template-based monitoring configuration service (MCS) for dynamic, yet standardized bulk monitoring configuration across technologies
• Inventory and group management with CMDB integration and dynamic discover
• ITOM tool integration for provisioning and orchestration through published APIs and alarm noise reduction with fault management along with incident management thru ITSM
• Open architecture, truly multi-tenant and extensible to meet the global enterprise needs and also host centralized monitoring offerings by managed service providers
• Easy triage with role-based technology-led dashboards, both out-of-the-box and customized based on triage needs

What should IT orgs do now? 

Most organizations are simply having a difficult time matching their tech velocity with the cloud, which is evolving more rapidly. CIOs must now develop effective cloud strategies with matching capabilities (talent and tools) that can map out a changing path forward while effectively managing and hedging the evolution. 

These companies should evaluate and choose the right toolset that is:

• A partner in embracing the evolution
• Open for extension to support unforeseen technology
• Highly scalable to meet the increasing dependency of IT services across other departments in the organization.

Implementing an infrastructure monitoring tool like DX UIM can help bring the observability needed to manage and prepare for an increasingly complex environment. For resources on infrastructure management, visit Broadcom Enterprise Software Academy's DX UIM page.