Media Coverages
As Published in SQL Server Magazine, February 2007
Industry Briefings
Patch, Provision, Replicate, Repeat . . .
Don't You Have Better Things to Do?
If you're the type of database administrator who yearns to manually patch many heterogeneous databases and genuinely takes pleasure in performing routine tasks that you know ought to be standardized and automated, then GridApp Systems' (http://www.gridapp.com) Clarity 3.2 product line is probably not a fit for you. If, however, you're among the growing number of DBAs who, as Matthew Zito, Chief Scientist for GridApp Systems, cites, spends "85 percent of the workday on routine administrative tasks like patching, replication, and provisioning," then you might just find Clarity products of interest.
In an industry where solutions to manage high-value tasks such as performance tuning and database design are the norm, the Clarity product line seeks to reduce the time DBAs spend on lower-level manual tasks by providing automated provisioning, patching, cluster management, and validation, thus freeing up time and increasing productivity. The Clarity product line can automate and standardize database policy and function from one pane, whether the database is SQL Server, Oracle, IBM, or another platform.
Clarity also makes compliance regulations easier to follow. "When we talk to clients, they say their DBAs are terrified by Microsoft or Oracle database audits," said Zito. He went on to explain that most DBAs have only a vague idea which databases need patches at a given time. "Before Clarity, the standard in compliance was an eighty-page Word document released by the auditors that the DBAs cut up and handed out to different departments." With Clarity, default standards are created by the administrator and then automatically applied to every database in the organization. A reporting trail is created so that a DBA can see what's missing and what needs immediate attention.
—Sam Davenport