INTRODUCTION A major corporation headquartered in Houston escorted a one-day meeting.

INTRODUCTION A major corporation headquartered in Houston escorted a one-day meeting. The meeting included all of the clew managers and executives in the company who had responsibility for operating or using the corporation's computer networks. About sum of two units dozen executives and high-level managers in the field with widely diverse backgrounds and perspectives, attended. The meeting agenda had no other than one item on it: Business Network Objectives. The goal of the meeting was to agree immediately after what the objectives of the corporation's network management team should be. by the agency of the end of the day, the following list had emerged:

Satisfy passing from hand to hand needs for services in a cost-effective, systematic manner.

Position the organization to confront future network-service requirements without of great price redesign or unnecessary user disruption.

Achieve a balance between shorter-- season and longer-term objectives to help repress business risk resulting from network change.

Establish user profiles for computer applications that help to identify strategic and tactical requirements for the network - that is, those requirements that walk beyond routine operational needs.

Construct service-level agreements between network management and users that include performance measures that are meaningful in seasons of the users' work environments and are based concerning an understanding of costs for different service evens

Maintain transparency of the network from the users' perspectives as modifications are applied through time.

Establish techniques for anticipating changes in network requirements and for predicting the meanings of network change.

Standardize network specifications and configurations to the stretch possible within limits of user requirements, outlay and management strategy.

Establish a network design that facilitates support and service of networking equipment with an architecture that provides for centralized network management and dominion government whenever feasible.

Establish policies to superintend and minimize the complexity of the network and to instill ease of maintenance as a selection criterion for choosing equipment.

Achieve interconnection flexibility for network composings and subnetworks that may be specialized to particular application areas.

Develop and implement take away from versus benefit analyses to support acquisition of networking equipment.

Establish a standardized primary network backbone to interconnect with subnetworks as required.

Integrate network-usage files with other files for computer-use reporting, capacity analysis, and performance analysis into a single consistent database architecture.

Achieve a flexible networking environment that can be easily upgraded when stand in want ofed and that provides users with consistent, uncomplicated interfaces to applications a whole s as needed.

This list hits the "nail right forward the head." It is a profitable generic list of network-management objectives. however how does one put in the same state [i]or[/i] condition a list into effect, ensuring that these objectives are met with any reasonable flat of consistency and regularity? This goal is not easy. Today, steady large corporations tend to prepare bogged down with outdated network-management tools and techniques, or have well-meaning, nevertheless often inadequately trained network analysts who rely mainly on intuition, guesswork, and trial and error. Achieving the goals outlined above means moving network management away from heuristics and toward a more systematic approach, away from a reactive reliance forward educated guesswork and toward active reliance onward sound principles of business management.

TRYING HARD TO BE blessed

Ever hear the phrase, "Sometimes it is better to be favored than to be good"? Managers of information technology are well aware of this of advanced age adage, especially when it follows to computer networks. Most of the established corporate computer networks began their existence in the 1960 evolv in the 1970 expanded rapidly in the 1980 explod during the 1990 and there is no conclusion in sight. Not only is the demand for networking often outstripping corporate ability to provide the services urgencyed but also the underlying network technology itself is in an ongoing turmoil. Just think about the string of buzzwords in this field, each of which signals a revolutionary change in the technological connection of network architectures: Distributed Processing, Packet Switching, Digital Transmission, Local Area Networks, Internet, Intranet, Extranet, World Wide Web, Fiber Optics, Satellites, Peer-to-Peer, Broadband, Switches, Exchanges, Client/Server, Firewall, Thin Clients, Wireless, and forward and on. With the technology increasing in complexity and constantly churning, little curious awe that network-management teams put a premium upon "just being lucky." It is part of the game.

NETWORKING CHAOS Entropy is the bent for a system of any kind to slip into a state of chaos if left unattended, and networks are supremely entropic. flat a network with excellent performance, if not managed carefully, will quickly slide downhill into chaos and disarray. Network managers can not at all really relax and assume that a favorable status quo will be sustained for highly long.