The Perils of "One Size Fits All" SEM and Log Management Packages

"Smokey my friend, you're entering a world of pain."
-Walter Sobchak, The Big Lebowski

"A Jack of all trades is a master of none"

Today's post is going be a little outside the technical realm of log management, but is an important post nonetheless.

Often, we receive RFPs (requests for proposal) from companies wanting us to run through a "supports/does not support" checklist of log generating devices. It seems that upper management loves to approach enterprise log management as a quest for the one holy grail product that can manage logs from hundreds of different devices and operating systems, in addition to folding the laundry and making coffee.

This approach to procuring log management technology is fatally flawed from the outset.

The thousands of log generating devices and operating systems in today's marketplace truly and completely prevents any vendor from being a polymath at all of them. Some vendors may try to lay claim to supporting tens, or even a hundred of said devices, but often the reality is empty marketing rhetoric without the robust technology present to deliver on the claims.

For example, the level of nuance and detail in the Microsoft Windows ® event log alone is enough to keep a substantially sized development team busy all the time. We can testify to this, as the Microsoft Windows event log is our area of expertise. Multiply this level of nuance and detail by a factor of hundred, or even a thousand, and you have an untenable goal for even the largest of software corporations.

Moreover, value gets diluted very quickly when you start looking at the price tag of "one size fits all" log management packages, especially when compared to picking up a handful of best-of-breed tools that specialize in log management for specific operating systems or devices. Take a hard look at the reporting in one of those mega-SEM packages and see if that "value dilution" is not readily apparent. 10 to 20 log generating devices may be "supported", but reporting will often be limited to a handful of reports per device.

To play devil's advocate for a minute, let's assume that one of these mega-SEM vendors has a very diligent, hard working development team that cranks out new reports as often as possible. What happens when the way an event gets logged on a particular OS changes or a new service pack is applied? Whoops! Back to the drawing board. Patch, patch, patch and fix all of those previously "finished" reports. As the number of reports increases, each new logging change that happens after an OS upgrade or device firmware patch increases that mega-SEM vendor's work by an order of magnitude. Eventually, entropy will take over, making quality suffer while updates are issued in a less timely fashion. It's a battle that cannot be won, even with the best development efforts and the most earnest intentions.

It's tempting for CIOs and CTOs to buy into the mega-SEM hype - the fantasy of having the logs of hundreds of different devices and computers all neatly aggregated with hundreds of ready-to-be-summoned reports at their fingertips. In fact, one can argue that many of these mega-SEM vendors aren't selling software - they're selling the CxO's dreams right back to them. Unfortunately, these dreams are never fully realized. And the results are tragic:

• Hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars, spent on the actual software or appliance


• More hundreds of thousands spent on service contracts and consulting


• Lost employee hours attempting to get the behemoth package to work


• Significant opportunity costs to the business during this process


• Additional software costs when new vendor packages are purchased to produce the sort of information the mega-SEM package was supposed to be delivering in the first place.
  

Enough doom and gloom. Here's a novel philosophy that CxOs can use to reduce the pain and maximize the gain of procuring log management technology:

Step 1: Delegate the work of procuring SEM and log management packages to the department heads that manage the different assets of your network (e.g. the Windows Platform team lead, the *Nix Platform team lead, the Infrastructure/Router/Switch/Firewall team lead).

Step 2: Instruct your various department heads to research and test the best-of-breed log management offerings that are directly relevant to the devices and computers they manage. These department heads are in a unique position to understand the subtle details that can sink or swim a particular SEM package in your environment. They can also tell you the role and quantity of the devices they manage, so you can make a more more targeted distribution of resources (e.g. 80% of all managed devices are Windows servers, 15% are *Nix, and 5% are Other).

Step 3: Empower your department heads to procure the log management package that best suits their realm of your network, and make them responsible for managing, operating, and documenting the software, producing reports on a recurring basis that can be directed to you as needed.

It is our contention that if you adopt this approach, your log management project and procured technology will be:

• Under budget


• Less prone to failure


• Less vulnerable to obsolescense or downtime caused by critical changes in event logging


• More likely to produce higher ROI

Thus we conclude our public service announcement on this topic.