Managing Web services and applications that use them could become easier with the release of several management packs by Microsoft partners. The management packs integrate these partners’ Web services management products with Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM), letting MOM users monitor the health of applications that use Web services and respond to events that could degrade application performance. Such capabilities are critical to making Web services reliable but can be difficult to implement given that these applications often consist of long-running transactions spanning multiple computers and computing platforms (for example, in environments that include both J2EE- and .NET-based services).

Although native Web service monitoring features are lacking in MOM today, Microsoft plans to provide support in the next release of the product. While this is likely welcome news for companies looking to deploy Web services, it could squeeze ISVs hoping to make a market in management tools for such applications.

Hard Problem: Managing Web Services Applications

Accessing and monitoring application-specific health information is critical to making applications reliable, yet it is particularly difficult to do in the world of Web services. Because applications based on Web services often involve long-running transactions performed on remote systems running a mix of OSs and run-time environments, collecting and correlating health information from the parts that constitute such applications and presenting a comprehensive view of this information is a daunting challenge.

MOM provides a foundation that developers or administrators could use to build rudimentary management capabilities for Windows-based systems hosting Web services: it monitors Windows Server computers for important events (which it stores in a central database) and can take corrective actions automatically based on administrator-supplied rules and scripts. The product also includes a number of prepackaged management packs that contain rules and scripts for monitoring Windows OS services, such as Internet Information Services (IIS).

However, MOM does not provide higher level capabilities specific to Web services applications, such as the ability to test for availability of non-Microsoft Web services components or whether the Web services are running properly.

Solving this difficult management problem is critical for the success of Microsoft’s Web services strategy—without a solution, businesses will likely be reluctant to migrate business-critical functions or applications to Web services architectures.

ISVs Plugging the Holes

MOM 2004, which has just gone into its second beta, will have more built-in features to monitor and manage Web services, including those that run on non-Microsoft systems. In the interim, the company has made available the MOM Connector Framework (MCF), a free add-on for MOM Service Pack (SP) 1 that provides a mechanism for exchanging management and control information, such as alerts, between MOM and third-party tools. Microsoft hopes this will inspire ISVs to integrate MOM with their own management tools.

At the Oct. 2003 Professional Developer’s Conference, ISVs Actional, Amberpoint, and Computer Associates stepped up to this invitation, announcing management packs that allow their Web services management platforms to exchange information with MOM via the MCF. This could help customers solve the problem of managing Web services applications in heterogeneous environments.

The Actional Web Services Management Pack gathers and passes Web service usage statistics and health information to MOM via Actional’s MCF connector, called the Looking Glass MOM connector. This information can be aggregated and viewed in the MOM console, giving operations workers the ability to monitor service health from a single console. Similarly, Amberpoint’s Management Pack for MOM 2000 can pass information, such as Web service performance or availability data, gathered by Amberpoint’s Web services management products to the MOM console for operator monitoring. Operators can launch Actional’s or Amberpoint’s management consoles from MOM, giving them direct access to the advanced Web services management capabilities offered by those companies’ products. For example, an operator could launch Amberpoint or Actional to analyze a critical alert in a shipping transaction that involved several Web services, determine where and why the transaction failed, and take corrective actions, such as restarting the transaction.

Computer Associates recently added Web services capabilities to its Unicenter suite of management tools with the release of Unicenter Web Services Distributed Management (WSDM), based on technology gained in its recent acquisition of Boston-based Adjoin Solutions. The Unicenter Web Services Management Pack will allow MOM users to configure certain Unicenter WSDM actions from within the MOM console: for example, an operator could configure Unicenter WSDM to collect specific data related to a Web service’s performance, and then take corrective actions based on those data.

Availability and Resources

A white paper describing Web services management and MOM is available at www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=d2c93c90-ec28-4bc1-b839-2173af408cd2&DisplayLang=en.

For downloads and more information about the Microsoft Connector Framework feature pack, see www.microsoft.com/mom/downloads/mcfp.

To apply for participation in the MOM 2004 beta program, which is invitation-only, see www.microsoft.com/mom/downloads/mom2004beta.asp.

The Actional Web Services Management Pack and the Looking Glass MOM connector are scheduled for release by the end of 2003. For more information, see www.actional.com/products/web_services/index.asp.

Amberpoint’s Management Pack for MOM 2000 is available now. For additional information, see www.amberpoint.com/solutions/mgmtpack.shtml.

Computer Associates' Unicenter WSDM is available now. The Unicenter Web Services Management Pack is scheduled for release in the first quarter of 2004. More information is available at www3.ca.com/Solutions/TechnologySubSolutions.asp?ID=4838.

For background on MOM, see "Operations Manager Provides Crucial Infrastructure Support" on page 3 of the Sept. 2001 Update.