Everyone wants a single source of truth

Concerning CMDB, I guess it's the point of CMDBf (implemented in the Eclipse's COSMOS project) : standard queries to get a centralized view from heterogeneous data repositories.

Alex

it's great to find someone in the enterprise systems management tool community that's getting a handle on a/ the complexities of the integration problem and an awareness that most of the enterprise architecture has been working on for fifteen years or so.

There is no silver bullet here - and many trade offs, which need to be understood for each user organisation.

It's not normally practical to tie together systems as you describe as you'll impose some new non-functional requirements on availability, performance and data quality that are beyond their original design scope.

I agree Tim, there is no silver bullet, but contrary to conventional wisdom, such systems can -- and in many cases should -- be tied together for practical reasons. In fact, Managed Objects can integrate --at an API level -- virtually any existing IT management tools on the market today. In addition we can integrate these with business metrics data such as KPIs. Most vendors -- particularly the larger companies -- would rather not see their customers integrate existing tools, but rather migrate all of their tools onto their own platform under the auspices of vendor consolidation. While the idea of dealing with one single "strategic" vendor can be alluring but it comes at a high and perhaps permanent price: vendor lock-in. By contrast we feel that integration not only enables enterprises to leverage their existing investments in IT management tools, but also allows them the flexibility to choose the best tools for a given environment while keeping a single consistent enterprise-standard interface. No other vendor can match our ability in this regard; we’ve been doing it for more than a decade. As my colleague Michele recently wrote on ITSMwatch.com, "Most large organizations have enough raw materials—some combination of a service desk, enterprise monitoring, asset management, or discovery—to begin building a CMDB today. With these tools installed, there are enough data elements to begin relating the data into the constructs of service. By virtue of having these tools in place, IT also has some degree of process. Through the course of integrating these pieces, IT organizations will continue to enhance the discipline and rigor to their change and configuration process."

- Jim