Hi community members,
I'm a Senior IT Consultant in a government department.
I'd like to know how Control-M compares with other products in terms of workload automation and orchestration?
Greg KawasakiI design for multiple clients which use a multitude of workload automation tools from Chef and Puppet, BMC Control M, Broadcom Autosys & CA7, Microfocus WAM, IBM WAM, TIDAL and Active Batch.
The top 2 of what I run into are BMC Control M and Autosys. See also Chef and Puppet - open-source and DevSecOps. The issue I run into is a fat vs light client.
BMC has been a long-standing leader in my book - been around a long time and reliable. Recently see more Chef and Puppet
Bartłomiej WlazłowskiPlease look at Enterprise Management Associates webpage. They are doing kind of deep analysis and comparison of all leading WLA products. I can also provide you this report
Radomir P.Sometime ago I have preapring a comparison matrix of workload automation tools. Control-M is one of top schedulers it is very up to date regarding cutting-edge technologies with one con - it is a fat client. It is not web-based so you need to install client on every workstation, visibility is also limited especially for huge constructs like 100+ tasks/jobs. Personally I recommend to look on BMC's alternative Stonebranch's Universal Automation Center. I am working for 6 years now using this tool for enterprise class workloads (ING). Appolication is satisfying Security requirements, it is stable, flexible, it supports unix/windows/zos platforms and some agentless technologies too. Price for the software is indivually set after consultation and researching his needs.
Mark Francome (The Stamford Group (has now rebranded) More Follow Visit website)@Radomir P. - although the fat client can be painful it is not mandatory.
Other options include:
1. For end users there is the web-based Control-M Self Service (great for browsing only users or limited interaction).
2. Many sites publish the fat client as a Citrix service and use it that way (i.e. one single install).
3. The installation of the fat client can be administered from the CCM, which makes life easier.
Most sites that I know only give the full-fat client to the Control-M Admins, maybe 5 or 6 users at most.
Radomir P.@Mark Francome I have worked using the configuration you have suggested. The Citrix I have worked on was restricted for any data movement between control-m and my workstation. As a result it was hard to smoothly generate reports, create workflows snapshots and so no. Of course it depends on citrix configuration, but still I find it less user friendly to web-based interface. As you already said control-m self-service is limited and it is Control-m's big vulnerability for the favor of such applications like UAC for example. Web-interface is more flexible, easier to maintain. It could be more broadly accessible and secured in parallel.
Installation of UAC can be also processed using automation tools such as SCCM, Ansible, or Puppet. It can be easily moved to the private or public cloud.
In general choice of the tools depends of requirement and infrastructure capabilities. For specific scenarios both application have dadicated to use. Control-M still is a elite among the other tools, but for the time being my choice is Universal Automation Center because is ... more universal :) than its competitors.
Gerardo BatuyongWe have been using Control-M from BMC for about seven years now, and we are very satisfied with its capabilities in the areas of workload automation and orchestration and enterprise integration. I'm sure we will continue to use Control-M and related products and supported APIs in the years ahead.
Russell Rothstein@Gerardo Batuyong The most popular comparisons of Control-M are with:
Broadcom: https://www.itcentralstation.com/products/comparisons/autosys-workload-automation_vs_control-m
IBM: https://www.itcentralstation.com/products/comparisons/control-m_vs_ibm-workload-automation
Red Hat Ansible: https://www.itcentralstation.com/products/comparisons/ansible_vs_control-m
Have you looked at any of these solutions? How do they compare with Control-M?
Mark Francome (The Stamford Group (has now rebranded) More Follow Visit website)Control-M would win over the competition in 95% of cases, the only issue really is the cost and whether your enterprise needs all the whistles & bells that come with the product and partner products. Cost-wise, if I was looking for something on a slightly smaller scale I would consider Tidal. Tidal's licensing model is definitely easier than BMC's and is made for those who have to consider their budget more closely. However, Control-M has been developed for more than 30 years now and it is pretty difficult to compete with that depth.
At the moment I am not sure I'd consider the collection of products that Broadcom now own. Are we looking at the beginning of the end, will firms be milked for legacy systems that comprise the backend of many big corporate entities? I wouldn't want to make that mistake.
If you are a new enterprise then BMC's cloud offerings look very competitively priced when compared with the traditional "on-prem" Control-M systems. I know some companies who create ad hoc Agents in the cloud for the duration of the batch and scrub them once done - you cannot get much more efficient than that.
Either way, you need to be very sure about your choice. Migrating off a scheduler is one of the IT world's great "thankless tasks" and you need to know that the scheduler you purchase will see you through the next generation of IT.
PeterBirksmithIt depends on implementation.. job creation doesn't necessarily need to be strict. It can be WAY more granular and can setup so that users essentially create their own jobs via a kind of cut-down GUI with the equivalent of your IT team only finalizing them to make sure things look valid and adhere to the policy.
Very flexible, and can be relatively straightforward technically after the initial learning curve as long as things are kept basic... It's kind of extendable as you want to make it (but the more complex and technically challenging it becomes the further you take it)
BMC (vendor) are now pushing it as "jobs as a service" - which for our specific setup would be massive, massive $$ but for a smaller situation could be more workable...
Consider ROI & TCO with your implementation. There are less expensive alternatives available and the trend is toward Consulted ($) + Open Source Products.
Which would you choose and why?
