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Are Your Monitoring Systems Ready for the Cloud?

In a recent survey of 300 application developers, conducted by Boundary, we found that nearly 60 percent of participants had been affected by a Cloud outage. Around 72 percent of participants experienced significant costs from Cloud performance issues: thousands of dollars per incident and/or in excess of $100 per minute of downtime. This isn't stopping companies from moving to the Cloud, of course. The same survey found that 67% of developers say that their company is hosting “business-impacting” applications in the public Cloud.

Other surveys show similar concern around performance in the Cloud. The Cisco 2012 global Cloud computing survey indicated that Cloud application performance was one of the top three challenges for companies in migrating applications to the Cloud, after availability/reliability and device security.

It's easy to point the finger at the hosting companies. They're managing the infrastructure, so ultimately they must be responsible for performance, right? Not so fast.

Running services on the Internet is not foolproof. Whether due to weather, natural disasters, equipment failure and/or operator error, outages will occur. Large IaaS vendors, such as Google, Rackspace and Savvis, are operating highly interdependent, complex services based on dozens of data centers, broadband connections and thousands of servers around the world; 100 percent uptime is simply not possible. Plus, third-party providers can't see into your environment; they don't know what contingencies are playing out on your own network, third-party APIs and services that are being used or in the code that you wrote.

It's up to companies to fill in the gaps where their hosting partners will inevitably fail. And doing so requires a different type of monitoring capability than in years past. An industry luminary Michael Biddick, recently wrote about the need for a new generation of APM tools which can effectively monitor all components of the application and supporting infrastructure, including system and network performance. Next-generation APM systems must locate the underlying component causing the problem, he writes. Finally, APM systems working alone or with complementary products must suggest or take corrective action to resolve performance issues before they affect users.

This is sound advice. It's rare that one solution can accomplish all of these tasks. Most companies, including many of our customers, rely on multiple monitoring tools which work together and share information for quick identification of issues and resolution.

Importantly, these tools must be able to bring visibility across Cloud and hybrid Cloud environments. This dynamic, virtual infrastructure has proven difficult or even impossible for older legacy APM systems, designed for physical infrastructure, to manage.

As a result, systems, application and network groups often point fingers at one another, and waste time, while still not identifying which component is causing the issue.

If your company is using a legacy APM product and has invested a lot of money and time into it, you may be loathe to replace it. That's a valid consideration. It's worth talking to your vendor to determine how they can support your move to the Cloud. Will an update be coming soon to address Cloud monitoring? If not, can their product easily work with newer tools, to bridge the gap? But in general, new architectures demand new solutions.

Another trend is that APM tools are now offered as a service, just as the applications they monitor. This reduces the burden on IT to support yet another piece of software or appliance, and enables organizations to get up and running quickly on new monitoring systems as needed.

We are seeing a huge resurgence and growth in the APM market - causing a number of analysts to publish in-depth studies around market segmentation and needs. Companies want to monitor their IT infrastructures from an “application first” or top-down perspective, which is rendering traditional bottom-up tools as legacy. Something that everyone appears to agree on is that application monitoring is not a one-size-fits-all situation and customers should understand their requirements fully before selecting their partners. The good news is that with tools being offered as SaaS and on shorter-term subscription contracts, the cost of adoption and change has lowered dramatically.

We are seeing modern applications and Cloud computing drive huge growth in the new generation of solutions while traditional/legacy solutions are withering away. We are also seeing a clear distinction emerging between developer-focused solutions and operations-focused solutions, as follows:

Developer-focused solutions answer the question: “Where in the code is my problem area?” If the problem is not in the code, then of course these tools offer limited help.

Operations-focused solutions answer the question: “Where is my problem?” These tools must cover 100% of your environment but don’t go as deep in code analysis.

It’s a transitional time for the APM technology market. More than perhaps ever before, companies are realizing that to succeed in the massive change of placing IT services in the Cloud, an investment in comprehensive and always-on monitoring tools is a must. Otherwise, the Cloud can backfire. Users and managers will not quickly forget if their apps crash or sensitive data is lost forever. Selecting a next-gen APM tool today that is designed for monitoring modern, distributed, Web apps and services will help a company best prepare for a transition to the new enterprise computing environment underway right now.

ABOUT Gary Read

Gary Read, CEO and President of Boundary, previously served as CEO of Nimsoft, providers of the award-winning Cloud monitoring solution, where he grew the business from zero to over $100 million in bookings and 300 people. As CEO, Gary led all aspects of the company including product, marketing, sales, support, and finance, guiding Nimsoft to a successful acquisition by CA for $350 million. Nimsoft experienced significant worldwide growth, with approximately 1,000 customers in 36 countries. Prior to Nimsoft, Gary held executive positions at BMC Software, Riversoft, and Boole and Babbage.

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Are Your Monitoring Systems Ready for the Cloud?

In a recent survey of 300 application developers, conducted by Boundary, we found that nearly 60 percent of participants had been affected by a Cloud outage. Around 72 percent of participants experienced significant costs from Cloud performance issues: thousands of dollars per incident and/or in excess of $100 per minute of downtime. This isn't stopping companies from moving to the Cloud, of course. The same survey found that 67% of developers say that their company is hosting “business-impacting” applications in the public Cloud.

Other surveys show similar concern around performance in the Cloud. The Cisco 2012 global Cloud computing survey indicated that Cloud application performance was one of the top three challenges for companies in migrating applications to the Cloud, after availability/reliability and device security.

It's easy to point the finger at the hosting companies. They're managing the infrastructure, so ultimately they must be responsible for performance, right? Not so fast.

Running services on the Internet is not foolproof. Whether due to weather, natural disasters, equipment failure and/or operator error, outages will occur. Large IaaS vendors, such as Google, Rackspace and Savvis, are operating highly interdependent, complex services based on dozens of data centers, broadband connections and thousands of servers around the world; 100 percent uptime is simply not possible. Plus, third-party providers can't see into your environment; they don't know what contingencies are playing out on your own network, third-party APIs and services that are being used or in the code that you wrote.

It's up to companies to fill in the gaps where their hosting partners will inevitably fail. And doing so requires a different type of monitoring capability than in years past. An industry luminary Michael Biddick, recently wrote about the need for a new generation of APM tools which can effectively monitor all components of the application and supporting infrastructure, including system and network performance. Next-generation APM systems must locate the underlying component causing the problem, he writes. Finally, APM systems working alone or with complementary products must suggest or take corrective action to resolve performance issues before they affect users.

This is sound advice. It's rare that one solution can accomplish all of these tasks. Most companies, including many of our customers, rely on multiple monitoring tools which work together and share information for quick identification of issues and resolution.

Importantly, these tools must be able to bring visibility across Cloud and hybrid Cloud environments. This dynamic, virtual infrastructure has proven difficult or even impossible for older legacy APM systems, designed for physical infrastructure, to manage.

As a result, systems, application and network groups often point fingers at one another, and waste time, while still not identifying which component is causing the issue.

If your company is using a legacy APM product and has invested a lot of money and time into it, you may be loathe to replace it. That's a valid consideration. It's worth talking to your vendor to determine how they can support your move to the Cloud. Will an update be coming soon to address Cloud monitoring? If not, can their product easily work with newer tools, to bridge the gap? But in general, new architectures demand new solutions.

Another trend is that APM tools are now offered as a service, just as the applications they monitor. This reduces the burden on IT to support yet another piece of software or appliance, and enables organizations to get up and running quickly on new monitoring systems as needed.

We are seeing a huge resurgence and growth in the APM market - causing a number of analysts to publish in-depth studies around market segmentation and needs. Companies want to monitor their IT infrastructures from an “application first” or top-down perspective, which is rendering traditional bottom-up tools as legacy. Something that everyone appears to agree on is that application monitoring is not a one-size-fits-all situation and customers should understand their requirements fully before selecting their partners. The good news is that with tools being offered as SaaS and on shorter-term subscription contracts, the cost of adoption and change has lowered dramatically.

We are seeing modern applications and Cloud computing drive huge growth in the new generation of solutions while traditional/legacy solutions are withering away. We are also seeing a clear distinction emerging between developer-focused solutions and operations-focused solutions, as follows:

Developer-focused solutions answer the question: “Where in the code is my problem area?” If the problem is not in the code, then of course these tools offer limited help.

Operations-focused solutions answer the question: “Where is my problem?” These tools must cover 100% of your environment but don’t go as deep in code analysis.

It’s a transitional time for the APM technology market. More than perhaps ever before, companies are realizing that to succeed in the massive change of placing IT services in the Cloud, an investment in comprehensive and always-on monitoring tools is a must. Otherwise, the Cloud can backfire. Users and managers will not quickly forget if their apps crash or sensitive data is lost forever. Selecting a next-gen APM tool today that is designed for monitoring modern, distributed, Web apps and services will help a company best prepare for a transition to the new enterprise computing environment underway right now.

ABOUT Gary Read

Gary Read, CEO and President of Boundary, previously served as CEO of Nimsoft, providers of the award-winning Cloud monitoring solution, where he grew the business from zero to over $100 million in bookings and 300 people. As CEO, Gary led all aspects of the company including product, marketing, sales, support, and finance, guiding Nimsoft to a successful acquisition by CA for $350 million. Nimsoft experienced significant worldwide growth, with approximately 1,000 customers in 36 countries. Prior to Nimsoft, Gary held executive positions at BMC Software, Riversoft, and Boole and Babbage.

Hot Topics

The Latest

In the early days of the cloud revolution, business leaders perceived cloud services as a means of sidelining IT organizations. IT was too slow, too expensive, or incapable of supporting new technologies. With a team of developers, line of business managers could deploy new applications and services in the cloud. IT has been fighting to retake control ever since. Today, IT is back in the driver's seat, according to new research by Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) ...

In today's fast-paced and increasingly complex network environments, Network Operations Centers (NOCs) are the backbone of ensuring continuous uptime, smooth service delivery, and rapid issue resolution. However, the challenges faced by NOC teams are only growing. In a recent study, 78% state network complexity has grown significantly over the last few years while 84% regularly learn about network issues from users. It is imperative we adopt a new approach to managing today's network experiences ...

Image
Broadcom

From growing reliance on FinOps teams to the increasing attention on artificial intelligence (AI), and software licensing, the Flexera 2025 State of the Cloud Report digs into how organizations are improving cloud spend efficiency, while tackling the complexities of emerging technologies ...

Today, organizations are generating and processing more data than ever before. From training AI models to running complex analytics, massive datasets have become the backbone of innovation. However, as businesses embrace the cloud for its scalability and flexibility, a new challenge arises: managing the soaring costs of storing and processing this data ...

Despite the frustrations, every engineer we spoke with ultimately affirmed the value and power of OpenTelemetry. The "sucks" moments are often the flip side of its greatest strengths ... Part 2 of this blog covers the powerful advantages and breakthroughs — the "OTel Rocks" moments ...

OpenTelemetry (OTel) arrived with a grand promise: a unified, vendor-neutral standard for observability data (traces, metrics, logs) that would free engineers from vendor lock-in and provide deeper insights into complex systems ... No powerful technology comes without its challenges, and OpenTelemetry is no exception. The engineers we spoke with were frank about the friction points they've encountered ...

Enterprises are turning to AI-powered software platforms to make IT management more intelligent and ensure their systems and technology meet business needs for efficiency, lowers costs and innovation, according to new research from Information Services Group ...

The power of Kubernetes lies in its ability to orchestrate containerized applications with unparalleled efficiency. Yet, this power comes at a cost: the dynamic, distributed, and ephemeral nature of its architecture creates a monitoring challenge akin to tracking a constantly shifting, interconnected network of fleeting entities ... Due to the dynamic and complex nature of Kubernetes, monitoring poses a substantial challenge for DevOps and platform engineers. Here are the primary obstacles ...

The perception of IT has undergone a remarkable transformation in recent years. What was once viewed primarily as a cost center has transformed into a pivotal force driving business innovation and market leadership ... As someone who has witnessed and helped drive this evolution, it's become clear to me that the most successful organizations share a common thread: they've mastered the art of leveraging IT advancements to achieve measurable business outcomes ...

More than half (51%) of companies are already leveraging AI agents, according to the PagerDuty Agentic AI Survey. Agentic AI adoption is poised to accelerate faster than generative AI (GenAI) while reshaping automation and decision-making across industries ...

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