Policy madness

Lately there has been plenty of industry buzz around policy-based networking, but implementing it in an enterprise network may be no easy task.

Policy-based networking is a concept where access to network resources - such as bandwidth or servers - is governed by explicit policies, which a policy-based management tool can translate into commands sent to network devices.

Policy-based networking is usually considered a network management issue, but there really is no separating it from the hardware in your LAN. That's because most devices in the network need to support policies for it to be effective.

To implement policies in a consistent way across an enterprise, that business really needs to have equipment all made by a single vendor. Since most companies use multiple vendors' equipment, this is a substantial obstacle.

Plus, the politics of trying to figure out who in the enterprise deserves higher levels of bandwidth and quality of service won't be easy to navigate.

Network management vendors are just starting to develop tools with these thoughts in mind. Realistically, true policy-based management for the majority of enterprises is still years away.