1. Research Report
IBM’s System Director 6.3:
Improved Usability, Installability, Functionality
Executive Summary
When Clabby Analytics last examined IBM's System Director systems management
environment we noted that IBM had created a common management database (CMDB)
that enabled IBM’s System Director and IBM’s Tivoli management environments to make
use of the data that each program environment had collected. Using this data, Systems
Director was able to more effectively manage a systems environment from the firmware
level through the management of physical and virtualized servers (virtual machines).
Tivoli could also make use of data found in the CMDB to perform advanced management
functions such as automated provisioning through application tuning and performance
management. We noted that the unification of these two environments created a very
comprehensive systems management stack that could span from firmware through
automated provisioning and workload management.
A new revision of Systems Director (version 6.3) has just recently been announced. This
revision focuses on:
1. Improved usability;
2. Ease of installation; and,
3. Extended functionality.
From a usability perspective IBM has improved the overall look and feel of the product by
reorganizing the screen flows, by inserting more and clearer instructional messages, and by
making clever use of highlighting that draws users attention to what needs to be done next.
From an ease of installation perspective, the new Systems Director greatly simplifies the
deployment of the Systems Director master program and related plug-ins. And it now
makes use of an embedded IBM DB2 Enterprise Edition Database (meaning that to deploy
this product systems managers no longer need the assistance of a database administrator).
From an added functionality perspective, the new Systems Director adds new functions in
inventory management, and virtual machine support (with full support for the KVM
hypervisor), and in storage management (with extensions that allow information
technology [IT] managers and administrators to discover, inventory, and receive alerts
from both IBM and EMC storage devices). Further, with the use of additional plug-ins
(IBM System Director VMControl and Storage Control), System Director can be used to
automatically provision IBM and EMC storage.

2. IBM’s System Director 6.3: Improved Usability, Installability, Functionality
In this Research Report, Clabby Analytics takes a closer look at the recent improvements
made to IBM System Director. We describe how IBM has made this product easier, more
logical, and more obvious to use; how IBM has simplified the installation and deployment
processes related to Systems Director and associated plug-ins; and we describe some of the
new functionality that has been added to Systems Director that gives it greater control over
the physical systems that it manages (including new monitoring functionality all the way
down to the firmware level); greater control over virtualized resources; and greater control
over IBM and EMC storage devices.
Systems Director 6.3: An Overview
In a nutshell, Systems Director 6.3 offers systems managers and administrators with a
single point of control for managing physical and virtualized systems environments and
associated peripherals such as storage. It's simplified graphical user interface has been
designed to help reduce complexity and cost of IT management. Further, it creates a launch
point for plug-in applications that manage virtualized resources and that can provide
integrated service management. And, most impressive, it has been designed to work across
IBM's three server architectures: the IBM System x, Power Systems, and System z.
From our perspective, we see IBM’s System Director as a master management program
that provides several monitor and control functions to systems managers and
administrators. These functions include:
 Discovery and inventory;
 Visualization of server/storage/network infrastructure;
 Dashboard views with health and status information;
 Monitoring functions (including the ability to automate these functions);
 Physical and virtual systems management;
 Security monitoring and administration;
 Support for integrated service management (clothing support for integrated service
functions, automated support response, an update management); and
 Common cross-platform navigation and look and feel.
Adjunct add-on plug-ins to IBM’s System Director include programs such as IBM’s Active
Energy Manager and IBM Storage Control….
A Closer Look: What Has Changed in Version 6.3?
The first thing users of IBM’s Systems Director 6.3 will notice is that the opening screen
has been reorganized around four functions (see Figure 1 — next page). These functions
are:
1. Update IBM Systems Director;
2. System Discovery;
3. Request Access (to systems and systems resources); and,
4. Collect Inventory.
Using these tabs, users can perform initial setup tasks, view and/or activate various plug-
ins (such as VMControl or energy management plug-ins), and gain access to additional
information.
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3. IBM’s System Director 6.3: Improved Usability, Installability, Functionality
Figure 1: IBM’s System Director 6.3 — A New, More Streamlined/Logical Interface
Source: IBM Corporation — October, 2011
Notice on the left side of the screen in Figure 1 that a variety of tasks can be easily
launched. What we noticed as several of these activities were launched was that there have
been changes in functionality and in look-and-feel.
In short, with System Director 6.3, IBM has simplified the discovery, installation, service, and update
processes.
A Closer Look at Usability
As an example of how IBM has improved System Director usability, consider what
happens when the “inventory” tab is launched. In the past, an inventory request would
produce a list of all sorts of inventory information that is important to x86 managers and
administrators — information as deep as firmware releases all the way up to system
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4. IBM’s System Director 6.3: Improved Usability, Installability, Functionality
configuration details. With this much detail, managers and administrators were barraged
with information and sometimes had trouble finding what they were looking for. In the
new revision, IBM has redesigned the inventory screen to make it easier for System
Director users to locate the information that they need. Further, IBM improved the analysis
and reporting function of this task — and made it easier to export information to other
management/reporting environments.
From a look-and-feel perspective, IBM has improved usability “color coding” to draw
attention to potential next steps in a process (the next step in executing a task) — and IBM
has added several new messages to help operators better understand what they are doing.
Further, to inhibit operator errors, IBM has introduced what we call “halt” messages —
messages that need to be read before an action is taken. For instance, a user may want to
launch a wizard — but a halt screen shows up first to warn the user of the consequences of
his or her action. To perform the action, the user needs to acknowledge the halt screen
warning — and can then move forward.
In this revision, IBM has put a lot of effort into improving Systems Director usability while also focusing on
finding ways to help eliminate user confusion that could result in operational errors.
A Closer Look at Ease-of-Installation
IBM has done a couple of things to improve the installation process related to the
deployment of System Director and associated plug-ins. First and foremost, IBM has
integrated its DB2 Enterprise Edition with Systems Director 6.3 — making the deployment
of the database that Systems Director needs to perform its job much simpler.
Further, IBM has worked to make the deployment of plug-ins (programs that can be
associated with Systems Director to perform actions such as energy, storage, and virtual
systems management) easier to accomplish. Additionally, IBM has extended its free trial
offer for these plug-ins to 90 days from 60 days — and that 90 day time clock begins only
when a client first uses the plug-in.
It should be noted that some of the functionality actually remains in systems director even
if the client chooses not to purchase a particular plug in. For instance IBM’s Active
Energy Management plug-in contains an energy monitoring function as well as advanced
energy management functions (such as power capping capabilities). The energy
monitoring functions remain after the trial, even if a client chooses not to purchase. But the
advanced functions go away.
Finally, it should be noted that license management has been simplified in version 6.3 —
and activation is user-defined.
A Closer Look at Changes in Functionality
IBM Systems Director 6.3 introduces all sorts of changes in functionality, including
changes in security, virtual machine management, storage integration, and in performance:
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5. IBM’s System Director 6.3: Improved Usability, Installability, Functionality
 In security, IBM has simplified security administration by integrating
certificate/key management and unified user management functions.
 From a virtual machine perspective, IBM has expanded its virtual machine
hypervisor support to include open source KVM. (In fact, IBM’s implementation
will put KVM on a par with PowerVM — a very advanced virtual machine
manager that performs functions such as create/edit/delete, power on/off, alert
monitoring based on system health, virtual machine deployment facilities, and
relocation services (mobile partitioning).
 In storage management, the Storage Control plug-in now has support for EMC
storage devices including the ability to perform discovery and inventory actions, as
well as to receive alerts;And,
 In the area of performance, System Director 6.3 performs inventories faster (with
faster discovery and start-up times), while increase the number of endpoints that
can be managed.
Our Favorite Improvement: The Energy Management Plug-in
Clabby Analytics often produces white papers and webinars in the field of energy
management (especially as it relates to system utilization and to overall data center power
usage and cooling. And given the positions that we have taken in the past (we like
products and programs that help prevent energy waste), it is easy to see why we gravitate
toward IBM’s Active Energy Manager (AEM) plug-in.
IBM’s AEM plug-in is a software tool that performs certain basic monitoring functions that
help enterprises monitor, measure and control their energy usage — giving customers the
ability to exercise certain controls to reduce energy costs. What it does is it gives IBM
customers the ability to, from a single console, create a dashboard view of the actual power
usage across multiple platforms (this is a real-time view, not a benchmarked power
consumption historical view). And, even better, AEM works across multiple vendors x86
platforms. Using this tool set, IBM customers can find ways to conserve energy use
without impacting response time of the systems they're using and without interrupting
systems continuity.
Several of IBM’s competitors can monitor energy consumption at a system level. But IBM can do this
across all of its systems (including Power Systems, System z, i, and System x servers — as well as across
storage subsystems).
A closer look at AEM shows that not only does it monitor energy usage, it also allows IBM
users to to cap power usage at the system level (in other words, a system is given energy
parameters in which it is allowed to work) This is incredibly important for those customers
who may have signed an agreement with their utility companies where they have
thresholds in utilization of power — and if they exceed those thresholds they pay a
premium for power.
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6. IBM’s System Director 6.3: Improved Usability, Installability, Functionality
AEM allows IBM users to choose to tradeoff power consumption for performance in order to stabilize
power usage or even in a an outage, to be able to throttle back their systems to reduce consumption. This
is something that no other vendor offers our client.
Figure 2 provides an overview of the energy building-blocks served by AEM.
Figure 2 — Active Energy Manager Building Blocks
Source: IBM Corporation — October, 2011
Sunmmary Observations
Every major systems vendor offers a systems management environment that can monitor
system behaviors, enable systems administrators to take actions on those behaviors, and
that can generate reports on system behaviors and management actions. All of these
systems management environments offer a graphical user interface and the ability to launch
special purpose “plug-ins” to perform virtualization management and storage integration
tasks.
IBM’s System Director 6.3 is, in some respects, like these other vendor’s systems
management environments. It provides monitor and control functions designed to enable
managers and administrators to keep their physical servers up and running. But Systems
Director 6.3 has several enhancements and benefits that separate it from other vendors
server management environments. These differentiators include improvements in:
 Usability;
 Installation;
 Serviceability;
 Security;
 Reliability; and,
 Performance.
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7. IBM’s System Director 6.3: Improved Usability, Installability, Functionality
These enhancements lead to improved end-user and operations staff productivity gains —
enabling an enterprise to achieve faster time-to-value. In fact, IBM's study showed that
these improvements can increase IT staff productivity by up to 20%, while reducing IT
administrative costs by 34 to 42%. Further, IBM's installation improvements enable faster
and more flexible IT deployments that accommodate new and changing workloads.
Overall, Systems Director 6.3 provides a single, unified and simple point-of-control that
spans x86 servers, IBM Power Systems, mainframes, and related storage.
Clabby Analytics Clabby Analytics is an independent technology
http://www.clabbyanalytics.com research and analysis organization that specializes in
Telephone: 001 (207) 846-6662 information infrastructure and business process
integration/management. Other research and analysis
© 2011 Clabby Analytics conducted by Clabby Analytics can be found at:
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October, 2011 www.ClabbyAnalytics.com.