IT Baseline Protection Manual - The Information Warfare Site

Safeguard Catalogue - Organisation Remarks
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In the Unix world, "rdist" is a program that can be used for the administration
and distribution of software, for example, enabling software to be installed or
updated on remote computers. One feature is that it is possible to pick out
from a central software pool precisely those products which staff require to
perform their particular tasks and install them on the relevant computers.
Other add-on programs, some of them available free of charge (usually from
the university world), allow monitoring of the network via SNMP, for
example.
Solutions assembled in this way provide a cost-effective alternative for
relatively small and medium-sized networks. Generally, though, they are
dependent upon a skilled administrator, someone who in some cases may
make adaptations to local circumstances with extra programming, or who is
able to integrate additional functionality.
Such solutions are unsuitable for larger and very large networks, however,
because the functionalities are incorporated in various non-integrated tools.
The only practicable solutions for large corporate or agency networks are
system management systems. Before any such system is introduced, it should
be noted that this generally constitutes a considerable intrusion into the
running system and must be well planned. It is not rare for the introduction to
take more than 12 months, with investment of at least a six-figure sum for
relatively large networks. It is therefore important to choose well suited
management system. The following criteria should be taken into account when
choosing the system to be procured:
- What range of functions does the product offer?
- Costs
- Purchasing the software
- Purchasing additional hardware (in some systems one or more
central management servers will have to be purchased)
- Installation and operating expenses (in some cases it may even be
necessary to employ external staff)
- Training of staff
- Miscellaneous (e.g. migration costs on an existing platform,
adaptation/new development of local software, building work – for
example a secure server room)
- Safeguarding of investment
- To what extent is the system management product scalable (e.g.
number of computers expandable)?
- Can the platform grow with the company (e.g. number of possible
management domains, delegation of tasks)?
- What are the migration paths to the platform?
- What are the migration paths from this platform to another platform?
- Possibility of integration with other products
- Which server and client system platforms are supported?
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IT-Baseline Protection Manual: Oktober 2000