In the run-up to LinuxWorld Expo next week, Aduva yesterday announced three major enhancements in the 3.0 version of its flagship OnStage suite for system deployment and management.

"This release builds upon Aduva’s core competency of auto-dependency knowledge and lifecycle management functionality to simplify the complexities of system deployments and ongoing management of large and complex Linux environments through a unique knowledge-driven approach," said Zev Laderman, Aduva's CEO (pictured below talking to SYS-CON.TV at Web Services Edge East 2005, Boston).

The enhancements, said Laderman, further enable enterprises to reduce operating costs and maximize their return on investment "by significantly reducing the time and expertise required to build and deploy an up-to-date, secure, and reliable mission-critical environment that includes Linux and now Solaris."

Since the company’s inception six years ago, Laderman explained, Aduva has fine-tuned its OnStage product to enable enterprises to take advantage of the inherent benefits of Linux — choice, security, availability, flexibility and a lower cost of acquisition — while mitigating the risks and complexities of Linux’s rapid evolution and continuous change. OnStage checks system integrity without server downtime; replicates changes in configurations automatically across servers in disparate locations; corrects incompatible configurations; and much more.

The three major enhancements announced in the 3.0 version of OnStage today are:

1. Full support for Linux and Solaris from the same console. With the 3.0 release, Aduva's OnStage adds support for Solaris servers. This allows for the first time simultaneous management of Solaris and Linux hosts through a centralized graphical interface.

Laderman explained that Aduva added this functionality to answer a two-pronged market demand. "First," he explained, "enterprises have been looking for a way to actively manage Solaris for quite some time now—Solaris 8 has 5,000 patches alone. Many organizations got it working the first time and then locked it in the proverbial basement. They want to move from static to active management."

Laderman continued, "Also, as Linux has become more robust, enterprises have been eager to find the equilibrium between their Solaris and Linux environments, and managing the two from one console provides numerous benefits. With the 3.0 version, OnStage answers both enterprise needs."

2. Facilitating migration automation between Solaris and Linux. The added support for Solaris means that customers can enjoy the reliability of Solaris and the cost-effectiveness of Linux while Aduva handles deployments, from development through testing and production, and facilitates application portability between the two platforms.

3. Enhanced Linux management, reporting and new GUI. In 3.0, OnStage's GUI has been completely revamped for enhanced intuitiveness, usability, and efficiency. Plus, OnStage 3.0's new reporting module provides users with out-of-the-box tools to create customized compliance reports, identify compliance deviations across the environment, and take corrective actions. These are valuable tools in helping enterprise customers with their Sarbanes Oxley and other compliance requirements.

In addition, the reporting module supplies users with five other out-of-the-box reports: - Customizable reports give visibility into security vulnerabilities, configuration compliance, and management activities:

• CAN Compliance
• Incident Compliance
• Host/Profile Compliance
• Package Compliance

"OnStage 3.0 is a major, market-driven step forward for data center management," said Laderman. .

Zev Laderman Talks to SYS-CON.TV at Web Services Edge East