"Active Directory has matured very well," says John Rolls, ScriptLogic's senior director of product management. "We're seeing not just high adoption but a second generation that did a quick and dirty move years ago and now wants a clean AD." To meet the needs of Active Directory (AD) admins, ScriptLogic announced a "major" upgrade to its Active Administrator 5.0 product to include Windows Server 2008 support and a more navigable UI. ScriptLogic also announced that Active Administrator 5.0 can be bundled with two of Quest Software's AD products to create a comprehensive AD management solution, called, literally, Active Directory Management Solution.
Active Administrator 5.0 has a new UI designed for easy navigation that's more in line with ScriptLogic's other products, and it offers centralized auditing of AD. With the new Server 2008 support, Rolls says, "An admin doesn't need to know Server 2008—we hide the complexity."
Active Directory Management Solution combines Quest Active Roles Server and Spotlight on AD with Active Administrator 5.0 to help companies manage roles, track daily tasks, and monitor a system’s overall health. Admins can create managed groups, delete and add user accounts, and do workflow provisioning. A senior admin might work with Active Administrator, then bring in Active Roles Server to delegate jobs to junior admins, and use Spotlight on AD for overall monitoring.
ScriptLogic sees the need for its product in organizations of 500 to 5,000 users. Its biggest competitor, Rolls says, is actually "the guy who chooses to go it alone, thinking, 'surely Microsoft has given me all the tools I need.'" But with the native tools, "Setting up levels of administration is hard. Auditing is built in, but it might take you a month to find what you're looking for and then it's gone." Before using Active Administrator, Rolls says, "Customers tell us they never really had AD under control."
To learn more about Active Administrator 5.0 and Active Directory Management Solution, go to http://scriptlogic.com.