When it comes to managing IT environments there’s more diversity in terms of the number of devices and systems that need to be managed than at any time in IT history. Alongside a plethora of Windows and Apple systems, we’re seeing everything from Google Chromebooks to multiple variants of Linux servers gaining traction at a time when there are still more Windows servers to manage than ever.

To help MSPs address that complexity Dell KACE today unveiled an upgrade to its core systems management platform that not only adds support for Google Chromebooks, but also provides agentless inventory of Windows servers and PCs and an ability to integrate server monitoring logs and alerts across Windows, Linux and Unix servers.

Growing IT complexity

To provide MSPs with a better sense of the chaos that has spread across the IT landscape, Dell contracted the market research firm Dimensional Insight to survey 723 IT professionals. Among the more notable findings were the facts that 60 percent of the survey participants were sure, or suspected, that there were unknown devices or applications connected to their networks and that 90 percent of them expect the total number or the total types of devices they would need to manage to increase in the next three years.

In addition, more than half admitted they were working with three or more systems management tools to try and control the chaos.

Approaching a tipping point

From an IT perspective these numbers suggest that many internal IT organizations are approaching a tipping point in terms of the ability to cope with managing IT. Google Chromebooks, for example, have proven to be especially popular in an education segment that has already deployed countless Windows and Apple Macintosh systems.

Bill Odell, vice president of marketing for endpoint systems management at Dell Software, says that as Dell systems management strategy continues to evolve the goal is provide an “anypoint” strategy that will enable MSPs to manage everything from servers to embedded systems connected via the Internet of Things (IoT).

For MSPs the prospect of having to manage all those systems is no longer theoretical. Every customer has a different IT environment and the days when an MSP could impose device or even infrastructure standards on a customer are long since over. For many MSPs the most strategic decision they will make in the months ahead is defining an extensible management framework that can adapt to whatever might come next. And anybody who tells you that they know for certain just what might actually be coming next probably has their pants on fire.