Is the Future here?
When just browsing the market of Service Assurance tools it really looks like the future is here. Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence and Automatic is predominant words in the ads or even in the name of the new and upcoming tools. It sounds like Terminator himself will start working in the NOC next week!
The development of the tools in the market and adoption of the technologies above move fast. Both the old classic suppliers and the emerging ones are on the chase to not be left behind when the overall IT community are moving to Internet of Things and autonomous systems.
The interesting thing is when I look deeper into what’s behind the labels it is still usually not any new technology or disruptive functionality. Sure, for a specific supplier or software it could be new. But in the Service Assurance space we have been doing ‘Internet of IT-Things’ for ages.
It’s more than 15 years ago we implemented algorithm-based alerting with ‘normal’ as the input. Also correlation, noise reduction and context awareness is what we’ve created in Netcool for almost 20 years. One of the first Netcool systems in Sweden just turned 18 years old and is still going strong.
What’s new is that this type of capabilities is becoming widespread and accessible for more implementations. And this is great! This is really powerful stuff and when implemented correctly it’ll be what really gives you the edge to start beating your operational challenges and measuring your SLA:s.
What we’re still waiting for is when the AI and Machine Learning you read about becomes more mature so we can use it in the generic space of operation and not only for very specific purposes in controlled environments. Even if we’re not quite there yet it’s time to start preparing!
So, is the Future here?
It depends on where you are. If you don’t have thresholds based on what’s normal and correlate your alerts with your SLA:s, agreements or business context, then yes, the Future is here!
Give us a call and we’ll show you what we’ve done while we been here.
Niklas Håkansson
Niklas.Hakansson@compose.se
