What is our primary use case?
Cutover is primarily used in my organization for automation purposes, mainly through the
Cutover page.
In my organization, Cutover was used as a migration tool for automating many tasks that would have been executed manually, such as running a script, executing the script, and firing the commands to migrate from on-premises to AWS cloud. Cutover served as an automation tool between these processes. All tasks were integrated into the Cutover page as runbooks, and execution happened directly with just one click on the Cutover page. Everything executes automatically in the back end. That is the main use case for automation.
During migration, we used to install the agent on on-premises services. If I were to do that manually for one server, it would take approximately one to one and a half hours to install the agent on the on-premises services, which already has all the infrastructure set up. When I integrated with CMF, which is another orchestration service from AWS called Cloud Migration Factory, and integrated it with the Cutover page or Cutover runbooks, the task became completed within five minutes. It takes a little time to integrate with CMF or AWS services with Cutover, but once that integration is complete, it gets finished within five minutes. The time reduction is significant; if done manually, it would take one and a half hours, around eighty to ninety minutes. Now, that task is completed within five minutes. That is the main use case.
From my experience with Cutover for migrations, whatever inputs were fed, such as input data, it provided approximately what was expected. It shows what is happening in the back end and what output is anticipated. Cutover has great accuracy and output for artificial intelligence-related tasks.
What is most valuable?
Cutover is a very productive tool, specifically for what I used it for, which is migration.
The best feature Cutover offers, from my experience, is that any kind of task or service can be integrated to execute any kind of task.
One thing I find especially useful is the visual runbooks feature, which has a very useful user interface. I just have to click on the buttons, and a lot of tasks in the back end are executed. Many AWS cloud services, CyberArks, and cloud service providers, along with a lot of inbuilt tools in the organization, were integrated. This is the main great feature of Cutover.
Another useful feature is that Cutover can easily integrate with AWS Lambda functions, step functions, storage, and CyberArks, where credentials can be retrieved and any kind of authentication, authorization credentials, permissions, and other services can be accessed. These were integrated to enable task admins or system admins to easily fire commands and call API calls. It is very useful for calling back-end APIs specifically.
Cutover has positively impacted my organization by helping create customized runbooks for migration and has assisted with a lot of things. From a productivity perspective, I saved around seventy to eighty percent of the time where I used to do one task manually. When I used Cutover, it improved productivity by seventy to eighty percent in the migration activities.
What needs improvement?
From what I have experienced with Cutover, it is a fantastic and very productive tool for things like disaster recovery, migration, or repetitive API tasks. All these things can be automated and save a lot of time. However, Cutover is available only at the enterprise level and is not available for startups or as an open-source tool. If Cutover were available to small teams who want to use it for disaster recovery or migration purposes on a small scale, not at the enterprise level, that would be great. If there were a free or limited version of Cutover for startups, it would spread awareness of what Cutover is across the IT industry and help IT admins or organizations understand how it can benefit them from a business perspective.
The user interface I have used in the last twenty-one months is very good, but it could be a little more feature-rich. There are a very small number of features available in the user interface, such as user management, runbook management, and runbook creation. These are the kinds of features that could be improved with respect to the Cutover user interface. Also, regarding documentation, from what I have used online or in Google searches, I find there is limited documentation regarding how to install it locally. If a startup or small-scale organization wants to use Cutover for disaster recovery, migration, or automation, there is a lack of documentation available online. That is something that can be improved with respect to Cutover.
For how long have I used the solution?
Cutover has been used for around twenty-one months, which is almost two years.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Cutover's scalability is good. It delivered on our service level objective or service level expectation as per the service reliability terms. It is highly scalable and available.
How are customer service and support?
Customer support for Cutover is good. As enterprise users, immediate support is received. Wherever issues are encountered or tickets are raised, assistance is received from their teams. Whenever blockades are faced, Cutover team helps find solutions for needs, and it is great.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
This is the first time Cutover has been used. When I joined the bank, services were being migrated, and the architect introduced this tool, Cutover. This has been the first use case with Cutover for around twenty-one months, which is almost two years.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
There were not many options; Cutover was the one option used for automation purposes. That is the only one that was proceeded with.
What other advice do I have?
Cutover should definitely be used as an automation tool, a migration tool, or a disaster recovery tool. The integration only has to happen in the back end one time, and if the integration is done, it just needs to be fired, and within a fraction of a second or minute, all tasks, business context, or business processes will be executed within a few minutes, depending on the task. Cutover would definitely be recommended to others for use as an automation tool for tasks like migration or any kind of day-to-day activities.
Cutover is the best artificial intelligence-enabled tool that can be used for automation, migration, and disaster recovery. I would really recommend others use it for runbooks, such as runbook templating and creating repetitive tasks. It will save a lot of time and increase productivity for teams. If Cutover could be made available as an open-source tool with limited users for small-scale industries or startups, it would be greatly beneficial for automation in small industries and organizations.
Regarding governance and security, while not that familiar with the governance and security perspective, I think it is very good. I believe they maintain guardrails, governance, and artificial intelligence security. As we are in the era of artificial intelligence and generative artificial intelligence, I think governance and security are being managed very well with Cutover from that perspective. My overall rating for this product is nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Private Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Other
