Zenoss Community Edition is a free and open-sourceapplication, server, and network management platform based on the Zope application server. Released under the GNU General Public License version 2, Zenoss Community Edition provides a web interface that allows system administrators to monitor availability, inventory/configuration, performance, and events. Zenoss Community Edition is by Zenoss Inc., which was founded in 2005 and is headquartered in Austin, Texas. The company develops hybrid IT monitoring and analytics software.
Technology overview
Zenoss combines original programming and several open source projects to integrate data storage and data collection processes with a web-based user interface. Zenoss is built upon the following open source technologies:
Zope Application server: An object-oriented web server written in Python.
A web-based portal provides operating system agnostic access to configuration and administration functions. Chrome, Firefox, and Internet Explorer/Edge are supported.
ZenPacks
ZenPacks provide a plug-in architecture that allows community members to extend Zenoss's functionality. The authors are free to choose how they license their individual ZenPacks. ZenPacks are encapsulated in Python eggs and provide instrumentation and reports for monitored infrastructure components. Currently there are over 400 ZenPacks available for various versions of Zenoss.
Enterprise
The enterprise version builds on the core version by providing commercial support and additional features, such as synthetic web transactions and global dashboards. "In the enterprise edition," writes Sean Michael Kerner, "Zenoss is adding something it calls end-user experience monitoring which is intended to more accurately simulate end-user application activity." Kerner continues, "Enterprise users also get certified application monitors specifically geared for Microsoft SQL and Exchange."
Developer
Zenoss Community Edition was developed by Zenoss Inc. and is supported by the Zenoss User Community.
Related products
Zenoss competes with other open source and proprietary enterprise systems management products. Open source systems management products are available from GroundWork Inc., Hyperic and Opsview. In an interview with Jack Loftus of SearchEnterpriseLinux.com, Bill Karpovich explains what makes Zenoss different:
"Companies like GroundWork are similar to the Red Hat approach, where a company gathers up the pieces and puts support behind it. Our approach is we have always had the code and we are in control of its roadmap and indemnification. The Hyperic model is where a company comes from a commercial background and makes some of the code open source."
Industry reviews
In a Network Computing review, Jeff Ballard singles out the Zenoss Core 2.0 user interface and event management system as highlights. Of the event management system, Ballard says, "By aggregating all events through a single rules-processing engine, Zenoss Core eliminates duplication, making for a manageable user interface." In his review, Ballard finds the installation troubling. "Unfortunately, getting started was challenging as Zenoss provided no context-sensitive help to guide us through a truly staggering number of configuration options." In the "Clear Choice Tests" Network World reviewer Barry Nance offers the following praise for Zenoss Core 2, "Even more impressive than its discovery of our network is its remediation features, which can automatically execute start or stop operations for a Windows service, for example." Nance's review finds that "Zenoss Core doesn’t support as many diverse devices as HP OpenView or Argent Extended Technologies, nor does it monitor Microsoft Exchange or SQL Server as closely as a commercial tool does." SYS-CON Media awards Zenoss Core the 2007 Enterprise Open Source Reader's choice award for best Linux systems management software. Reader choice awards are nominated and voted on by the community of Enterprise Open Source Magazine readers.
