Syncsort’s Ironstream now delivers mainframe network performance and security data to Splunk® for advanced analytics

Syncsort, a Big Data software firm based in Woodcliff Lake, NJ, announced on September 23 the availability of a new release of Ironstream^®, the unique-in-the-market product that provides mainframe machine data in real-time to Splunk Enterprise and Splunk Cloud™ customers. The new release leverages data collected by Syncsort’s recently acquired Zen z/OS® suite to provide IBMz network and security data and alerts to Splunk solutions for advanced visual analytics.

“Mainframe monitoring tools present major challenges and difficulties for security engineers and administrators who need to navigate back and forth between systems to troubleshoot problems,” said Snehal Antani, chief technology officer, Splunk. “Ironstream helps make it easier to collect, transform, and securely forward mainframe security data into Splunk Enterprise and Splunk Enterprise Security, where users can easily search, analyze and visualize the data to gain valuable end-to-end insights across Mainframe and other platforms in a single UI and advanced analytics engine.”

“Many legacy mainframe monitors have evolved into very complex and resource intensive solutions in an attempt to cover every aspect of the systems they monitor as they collect more and more data. Yet, they have technology gaps that don’t adequately address security threats. They may also not collect Syslog messages that provide insights into application performance and typically require subject matter experts (SME) with in-depth technical knowledge of z/OS^® to interpret the data,” continued Harvey Tessler, founder and general manager, mainframe at Syncsort. “With Ironstream and Splunk solutions, users can get a 360-degree view of enterprise-wide historical and real-time network management and security data without requiring this deep technical knowledge, straining systems resources, or adding costs.”

Syncsort Ironstream works with Splunk solutions to provide:

• Less complexity, making it easy to collect mainframe data and correlate it with data from other platforms for a 360-degree analysis, without the need for mainframe access or mainframe expertise.
• Clearer Security Information, making it much easier to identify unauthorized mainframe access or other security risks.
• Healthier IT Operations through real-time alerts to identify problems in all key environments like CICS, DB2, IMS, MQ and by monitoring transaction system performance, with views of latency, transactions per sec, exceptions and other valuable data.
• More Effective Problem-Resolution Management with real-time views of mainframe SMF data to identify real or potential failures earlier, along with the relevant ‘surrounding’ information to support triage repair or prevention.
• Higher Operational Efficiency by augmenting legacy silo monitors with new technologies that better correlate events across systems, enabling staff to resolve problems faster, to “do more with less.”

Source: Syncsort