ProCurve Networking by HP eases management of business-driven networks with new software

ProCurve Manager, ProCurve Manager Plus 1.6 and Identity Driven Manager 1.0 support the ProCurve Adaptive EDGE Architecture, enabling more business management by helping reduce the time spent on infrastructure management.

ProCurve Manager and ProCurve Manager Plus 1.6 are advanced Windows®-based network management tools that provide administrators with easy-to-use screens for configuring, updating, monitoring and troubleshooting ProCurve devices.

Identity Driven Manager 1.0 is an application for ProCurve Manager Plus that automatically manages intelligent network access, applying security and performance settings to network infrastructure devices based on user, location and time. This enables central definition of policies that are then enforced at the edge by ProCurve devices.

By automatically managing intelligent network access in this way, Identity Driven Manager gives enterprises more control over their networks, more productivity from their information technology (IT) staff, and more adaptability.

"Our goal is to help our customers in the Middle East focus on business needs and get more from their networks, without increasing complexity," said Ivan Kraemer, Sales and Marketing Director, HP ProCurve Networking Business for Mediterranean, Middle East and Africa. "Network administrators are concerned with enforcing security and improving performance on their wired and wireless networks while providing ease-of-use and appropriate access to network users. Our focus on industry standards and innovative research and development allows us to provide proven networking hardware and software to meet those needs, moving the network from a connection medium to a business enabler."

"Effective security is done at many layers. Dynamically securing access rights at the network physical point of entry, regardless of medium, whether it is wired or wireless, makes absolute sense," said Garry Range, senior network design engineer, Arch Coal. "ProCurve's Identity Driven Manager software, coupled with their switches, gives me the capability to do just that by applying security and performance policies based on user, location and time."

ProCurve Manager and ProCurve Manager Plus 1.6
ProCurve Manager and ProCurve Manager Plus 1.6 deliver a better return on investment by enabling administrators to do more with less.

For example, ProCurve Manager and ProCurve Manager Plus 1.6 ensure the network availability for vital business processes. Automated discovery and status update ensures quick and complete discovery of ProCurve devices and their availability status. Advanced traffic monitoring identifies heavy network users so that viruses, network abuse or network mis-configuration problems can be resolved quickly.

Auto-configuration of the network enables network administrators to quickly adapt network resources to meet increasing capacity, while auto-discovery of devices and integration with HP OpenView Network Node Manager allows business acquisitions to be more easily assimilated. Together, these features enable rapid business growth for ProCurve customers.

Additional ProCurve Manager Plus features include:

• An Events Summary screen displays alerts and categorizes severity, making it easier to track bottlenecks and fault events. Alerts present detailed information on the problem, even down to the specific port.
• Automatic updates from HP can be scheduled easily across large groups of devices at user-specific times, saving time and improving security with auto-assignment of security policies.
• A new, easy-to-use VLAN (virtual local area network) management interface allows the user to create and assign VLANs across the entire network, without having to access individual network devices.

ProCurve Manager and ProCurve Manager Plus 1.6 can run independently or with HP OpenView Network Node Manager 6.41 or 7.X, which allows administrators to monitor multi-vendor networks while leveraging ProCurve specific network management functions.

Identity Driven Manager 1.0
Identity Driven Manager 1.0 software helps administrators improve productivity by simplifying and streamlining network management tasks with central policy management and creation, and enforcement at the edge. It increases network functionality without the need for new network resources and is built on an existing switch platform that leads the industry in warranty and support.

Unlike other networking solutions that use proprietary infrastructures and protocols, Identity Driven Manager uses industry standards, giving customers more choice since it easily integrates with existing infrastructure resources. In addition, Identity Driven Manager is easy to implement, offering simple configuration on a central basis that is copied across the network, as opposed to proprietary configuration schemes.