Although these tools now have little or no interaction with one another, they are a big step for the once mainframe-dominated network of clinics that used to rely on frantic users who called in when trouble arose. "As we developed a more distributed type of environment, we began to rely more on being proactive with our network management," says Scot Busby, network manager of Phycor-Lafayette, of Lafayette, Ind.

Phycor-Lafayette is configuring some of these tools so that the products can, in fact, work together to handle a network call or outage. Although CiscoWorks reports detailed information on the Cisco network devices to HP's Network Node Manager using SNMP alerts, Phycor-Lafayette's Remedy Help Desk application isn't connected. So when Network Node Manager handles an outage, the helpdesk staffer then has to re-enter information about the event into the Help Desk application.

"We are working to configure Network Node Manager to e-mail the Help Desk application [using Microsoft Corp. Exchange], so a call will be automatically generated for a network incident," Busby says. This will also let the company gauge trends, such as how often problems occur, how fast they get fixed and whether the problem is with the carrier network or the equipment.

The company also is working to integrate its Microsoft SMS (Systems Management Server) 2.0 with Help Desk so that when a staff member or physician at a remote clinic calls in with a problem, the Help Desk application queries the SMS database to determine which hardware, OS and applications the user is running on his or her machine, and the IP address. Meanwhile, the EcoScope traffic-monitoring software by design runs separately from the other management applications.

Of course, a side effect of all this network monitoring with SNMP alerts and ICMP (Internet Control Message Protocol) pings is that it increases traffic on the network. "If your network is already congested, all the extra traffic can make it worse," Busby says. The company's main challenge, though, has been maintaining the OpenView database with updates and patches, he says. "When you are adding and deleting nodes to the network, you need to take steps to maintain the database or you can cause problems with the operation of Network Node Manager."

Busby also cautions that some software patches can actually harm, rather than help, the system. Phycor-Lafayette installed one OpenView Network Node Manager patch that was mistakenly posted to HP's support site before it was fully tested. The result: Phycor-Lafayette had to reinstall the entire Network Node Manager package.