Vendors say all companies can have systems that manage themselves.(AUTONOMIC COMPUTING)

Manufacturing Business Technology, March, 2006

The appearance of autonomic computing solutions for small and medium businesses (SMBs) may be the signal that this technology is shaking its pie-in-the sky image. Championed by IBM, autonomic computing is an approach to self-managed systems. Ric Telford, IBM's VP for autonomic computing, acknowledges the concept often is perceived as futuristic, despite its practical nature.

"Autonomic computing is a fancy way of saying there is a set of technologies that makes IT systems--servers, PCs, or databases--more self-managing;' says Telford. The term is derived from the body's autonomic nervous system, which automatically regulates functions like heartbeat. Likewise, says Telford, "in an IT shop, you would like the computers to handle the mundane tasks so...

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