Letter From the Editor Mark Nicolett 28 June 2002 As business processes become tightly coupled to IT, enterprises must think about enterprise IT architecture as an enabler of business agility. Because the IT infrastructure is the technology foundation for enterprise applications, the IS operations group must provide an IT infrastructure that is stable and agile. Achieving these seemingly contradictory goals requires an architected approach to IS operations. An IS operations architecture has organizational, process and technology components. This Spotlight focuses on the technologies that the IS operations group can use to improve operational agility and alignment with the. Network and systems management (NSM) vendors are moving to new product architectures that incorporate application integration middleware and Web services. The goals are improved scalability, deployment flexibility and external integration. We examine the architectural changes that NSM vendors are implementing and help you to distinguish vendor "marketecture" from architectural changes that provide operationally useful functions.    Read more

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	The Changing Face of NSM Architecture 28 June 2002 Debra Curtis To meet the demand for improved scalability, deployment and external integration, network and systems management vendors are modernizing their products to leverage new software architectures and development methods.

Message Bus: Not a New Hope for NSM Integration 25 June 2002 Debra Curtis The prospect of message buses enabling network and systems management products from different vendors to communicate is alluring, but integration will more likely take place through loosely coupled Web services.		NSM's Future: Services-Oriented Management Architectures 27 June 2002 Cameron Haight   Bill Gassman The underlying architectures of many network and systems management products are encumbered with proprietary interfaces that stifle technological advancement. Web-services-based technologies may unlock future progress.
NSM Architectures Benefit From Business Tool Investments 28 June 2002 Bill Gassman Enterprises' IS operations support systems will benefit from tools built on commonly available application platform suites, tailored by network and systems management vendors and integrated with business operations tools.		A Common NSM Framework Is Still a Dream 27 June 2002 Raymond Paquet Network and systems management frameworks haven't lived up to expectations. Ignore vendors' framework integration claims and concentrate on their products' features, functions, scalability and ease of implementation.