• Time -to-deploy applications: Enterprise applications have grown in complexity to the point where data center teams cannot deploy them fast enough to respond effectively to business demand. If IT resources are available as they are needed in an application-centric rather than infrastructure-centric model, then the business can be far more responsive to user needs, while driving down IT costs.

• IT costs: The current means of delivering applications wastes money. Even forms of virtualization add complexity to IT operations because they are static. By making application delivery dynamic, organizations can eliminate substantial waste in IT labor costs and free technical staff to focus on core competencies.

• Infrastructure utilization: In a static infrastructure environment, there is always serious redundancy. More often than not, these redundant systems are purely back-up resources that are left idle. If, however, these resources can be accessed around a network at any given time to ensure service delivery, then they can have a positive impact on the business. Moreover, with DASM, organizations can actually build on-demand infrastructure that is flexible enough to withstand unprecedented growth and unexpected business demands.

• Application SLA performance: By managing the performance of each application dynamically from initial roll-out through day-to-day operation, service levels can be tracked and responded to instantly.

• Infrastructure growth: Server sprawl has become a burden to IT organizations, adding complexity and cost to already over-taxed teams and budgets. One key to the next generation data center is the visibility to grow infrastructure to meet true business demand and avoid overbuilding data center capacity. 

The path forward

The next obvious question is: How do we get there? It is not as difficult as it sounds. Most organizations have already made huge strides forward in consolidating disparate IT resources and have begun leveraging data center "clouds" where virtual servers exist to support multiple business applications. The next logical step is to extend this principle to accommodate dynamic application services that reside on different physical machines.

DASM involves the introduction of logical principles that bring about greater agility. As the data center automates application delivery and management processes, it is able to align application service availability with the latest business needs. At the same time, the organization gains the ability to meet its service delivery promises.  

Application provisioning. As much as 80% of an application's development effort is spent preparing the environment for the software. A DASM model would streamline the myriad tasks involved with application provisioning. This frees businesses from these disjointed processes that add unnecessary cost and complexity to application deployment toward a more unified approach to optimizing application service management.

DASM involves taking the following steps in a consistent manner, based on pre-defined rules:

• Define and enforce application service levels

• Configure and package standardized application services

• Dynamically provision and activate applications to least cost infrastructure

• Dynamically scale application services based on service level agreements

• Dashboard to meter, chargeback and report on application service utilization and costs

Using this method reduces the cost of software development and speeds time-to-market. Applications can actually be provisioned and activated in minutes, not days.

Service-level management. Application provisioning is just the start. Companies need a way to respond to rapidly shifting user demands. The principle is simple, with DASM resources are automatically shifted without human intervention as changes are needed. Whatever application has the greatest demand at any given time will be allocated the appropriate amount of server resources.

In a DASM environment, organizations can build an SLA around through-put, latency and resource utilization. Virtually any statistic that the application exposes can be incorporated into an SLA policy to help determine the appropriate scale needed. This gives businesses the power to right-size their infrastructure dynamically based on response or page-rendering times. Policies can even be adjusted automatically based on a season or time of day.

Conclusion

DASM is an essential component for the next generation data center. This new model frees organizations from the rigid infrastructure of the past, freeing them to innovate without fear of IT constraints. Businesses not only benefit from the reduced cost of software development, but the ability to understand and instantly respond to changes in consumption. This gives organizations the confidence that the systems they invest in are operating at peak efficiency. Ultimately, this new approach to application service management simplifies IT, making it leaner and greener.

DataSynapse , Provisioning of Applications Quickly Adds Up , Realizing the Promise of Next-Generation Data Centers