OPS/MVS Automation Intelligence vs SCOM vs Top Secret comparison

z/OS, its subsystems, databases, middleware, applications, and software generate thousands of event messages daily. IT professionals need a tool to filter, prioritize, and respond quickly to these events before they impact availability and threaten business processing and associated service level agreements. CA OPS/MVS EMA automates processes, enabling you to resolve problems as they arise. It also automates more routine tasks, simplifying IT management and operations.

SCOM (System Center Operations Manager) is a cross-platform data center monitoring and reporting tool that checks the status of various objects defined within the environment, such as server hardware, system services, etc. The solution allows data center administrators to deploy, configure, manage, and monitor the operations, services, devices and applications of multiple enterprise IT systems via a single pane of glass. It is suitable for businesses of all sizes.

SCOM Features

SCOM has many valuable key features. Some of the most useful ones include:

• Application monitoring
• Database monitoring
• Threshold alerts
• IT Asset Discovery
• Predictive capabilities
• Server usage monitoring and capacity forecasting
• Application performance management console
• Server availability and performance monitoring
• Collaboration tools
• Virtualization monitoring
• Patch management
• Out-of-the box templates to monitor applications
• Application dependency mapping and thresholding

SCOM Benefits

There are several benefits to implementing SCOM. Some of the biggest advantages the solution offers include:

• Management and monitoring of Windows as well as Unix/Linux platforms
• Remotely connect to Windows machines and perform administrative tasks from the console itself
• Custom dashboard creation to help monitor the datacenter with ease
• Agent based monitoring
• Integrates well with other Microsoft products
• Easy to use and reliable

Reviews from Real Users

Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by PeerSpot users currently using the SCOM solution.

A Manager at a financial services firm says, “The feature I like most about SCOM is that it is easy-to-use. I find it very user-friendly. I also like the knowledge base which it has. You can find the resolution to questions or issues directly within the SCOM itself. It will alert you with a recommendation of what you need to do at the same time. This sort of self-diagnosis or prompting is one of the great values you get from SCOM compared to other solutions.”

PeerSpot user Zahari Z., Information Technology Auditor at a financial services firm, mentions, “Availability monitoring is the feature I have found most valuable, as well as the capacity and ability to send notifications. There is a mechanism to set up a notification from the SCOM and whenever there is a drop in the availability the notification alerts not only for availability but for other issues as well. You can align thresholds according to the speed of your environment and you can have a threshold related notification, which is one of the useful features.”

Bill W., Sr. Systems Engineer at Arapahoe County Government, comments, “ I like some of their newer features, such as maintenance schedules, because SCOM records SLA and SLO time. When we patch, things are automatically put into maintenance mode so that the numbers for our systems being down, do not count against us.”

A Project Manager at a tech services company explains, “The feature I have found most valuable is the book feature. While we run the Sprint one we can add some setups for multiple sprints.”

A Systems Engineer at an educational organization states, “Because it's Windows-based, it actually reports quite well. It reports everything you can think of on the Windows server and allows you to monitor anything. It's excellent for those in the Windows world as it's very good at it.”

CA Top Secret for z/OS provides innovative, comprehensive security for your business transaction environments— including z/OS, UNIX and Linux on System z—helping you realize the reliability, scalability and cost-effectiveness of the mainframe. CA Top Secret provides an Advanced Authentication Mainframe feature, system entry validation, resource control, auditability, accountability, administrative control, and SAF compatibility. In conjunction with distributed security solutions from CA Technologies, CA Top Secret provides mobile-to-mainframe enterprise class security and compliance management.

Top Secret Features

Top secret provides the following features:

• Access Control: Top Secret provides fine-grained control over user access to mainframe resources, allowing administrators to specify precisely which users can access specific datasets, programs, or system functions.

• Auditing and Logging: The solution generates comprehensive audit trails, capturing security-related events and activities, enabling organizations to monitor and analyze user actions for compliance purposes and security incident investigations.

• Secure Remote Administration: Administrators can also securely manage and administer Top Secret from remote locations, allowing for efficient administration without compromising security.

• Encryption: Top Secret supports encryption of sensitive data, ensuring that information stored on the mainframe remains protected from unauthorized access or disclosure.

• Role-Based Access Control (RBAC): By implementing RBAC, Top Secret simplifies access management by assigning privileges and permissions based on predefined roles or job functions, reducing administrative overhead.

• Integration with External Authentication Systems: Top Secret integrates with external systems, such as LDAP or Active Directory, enabling centralized user authentication and leveraging existing identity management infrastructure.

• Secure Communication Channels: TS ensures secure communication channels between the mainframe and external systems, protecting data transmitted across networks from interception or tampering.

• Compliance and Regulatory Support: Organizations can meet regulatory requirements and industry standards by providing security controls, auditing capabilities, and access management features.

• Secure Key Management: Top Secret facilitates the secure management of encryption keys and digital signatures, ensuring the integrity and confidentiality of sensitive information.

• Resource Protection: Mainframe resources are safeguarded from unauthorized access or modification, providing an additional layer of protection to critical assets and data.

• Security Monitoring: The solution provides real-time monitoring of security events and alerts, enabling proactive threat detection and response to potential security incidents.

• User Provisioning: Top Secret streamlines user provisioning processes, simplifying the onboarding and offboarding of users and ensuring that access is granted or revoked in a timely manner.

• Session Management: The product offers session management capabilities, including session timeouts and session termination, ensuring that user sessions are properly managed and secure.

• Top Secret Benefits

  Some of the benefits that Top Secret offers are:

  • Robust access control

  • Strong authentication mechanisms

  • Comprehensive auditing and logging

  • Protection of mainframe resources

  • Compliance with regulatory requirements

  • Secure remote administration

  • Encryption of sensitive data

  • Integration with external authentication systems

  • Secure communication channels

  • Support for encryption keys and digital signatures