The NDS train is building steam while the MSAD train is still being built at the shop...
NDS Poised To Manage Cisco Gear
Saroja Girishankar
Cisco users will be able to manage switches and routers from a single directory sooner
than expected, as the company last week bowed to user pressure to support Novell
Directory Services.
The move represents a departure from previous plans to support only Microsoft's
much-delayed Active Directory, which nonetheless remains Cisco's directory of choice.
IT managers, impatient for directory functionality to manage their Cisco gear, praised
the decision, which will result in NDS being able to centrally configure and monitor
Cisco routers and switches.
"We thought we would wait for Active Directory, but our need for directory-enabled
management is growing. Cisco's decision to support NDS and the delay of the Active
Directory is making us consider NDS definitely for the short term and even, possibly,
the long term," said Chuck Yoke, network architect at Janus Capital Corp.
The Cisco endorsement follows other recent NDS wins with Lucent Technologies and
Nortel Networks, and is a shot in the arm for Novell. The decision adds to NDS'
momentum, although Novell chairman and CEO Eric Schmidt stopped short of
declaring victory.
"The Cisco [agreement] is a big win for many of our users, us and for NDS, which is the
architectural underpinning of everything we do," Schmidt said. "With Cisco, Lucent and
Nortel supporting NDS, we are encouraged."
He added: "The issue is how to take advantage of this opportunity."
Cisco's support of NDS comes up well short of its co-development commitment with
Microsoft on Active Directory.
The NDS arrangement calls for interoperability between NDS and CiscoAssure policy
management products, including Cisco Network Registrar and Cisco User Registration
and Tracking service, in the first quarter of 1999. Novell will offer a Java-based agent
that lets NDS communicate with and configure routers and switches remotely, although
the company did not commit to a firm ship date. Novell said IT managers could use the
technology under development to perform user identity-based auditing, auto-discovery
of router configuration information and networkwide software upgrades, among other
functions.
Cisco, however, will not resell NDS with its products, whereas it will sell Active
Directory. Also, with Microsoft, Cisco is developing capabilities for user registration
and tracking from a single logon and, eventually, the ability to share information from
diverse directories while handling synchronization and replication between directories.
These capabilities also will be available on NDS at a future date.
Microsoft seemed unaffected by the arrangement. "Interoperability between directories
is very important to Microsoft and we support Cisco's efforts towards that," said Tanya
vanDam, group product manager at Microsoft. She added that the deal does not impact
the Cisco-Microsoft relationship.
Cisco acknowledged that some NetWare users pushed hard for the NDS arrangement.
"This announcement with Novell is a sign that we will leave our customers to make their
technology decisions, and we will focus on providing interoperability for those
technologies and products that they want," said Charles Giancarlo, Cisco's senior vice
president of global alliances.
Giancarlo conceded that timing-Microsoft is not committing to a general availability date
for Active Directory-played a role in the public pressure from customers wanting
immediate solutions.
"Directory-enabled management is absolutely something we have been looking for and
it's an idea that Cisco has been trying to address for over two years, and it finally seems
to have come to a good end with this arrangement," said John West, vice president of
applications development at CSX Technology Inc., the IT arm of CSX Corp., which
has several hundred Cisco routers.
Other users echoed West's sentiments.
"We are looking for ways to be more efficient and set policies for different user classes
and that is why these kind of developments are absolutely important to enterprises like
us," said Ian Reingold, director of data engineering at Sprint, a major Cisco and Novell
NetWare user.
One vocal user, Tom Ferris, a network consultant with an international financial
institution that uses Cisco routers and NetWare LANs, has literally led a crusade to
force Cisco to support NDS believes the company misjudged user demand.
Even so, Prudential Insurance Co., which has hundreds of Cisco routers in its network,
is willing to wait until NT 5.0 and Active directory roll out.
Copyright ® 1998 CMP Media Inc.
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