Table 18.1 compares the four states of autonomic computing with how we manage today and what it will be like with full autonomic systems.
Concept
Current Computing
Autonomic Computing
Self-configuration
Corporate data centers have multiple vendors and platforms. Installing, configuring, and integrating systems is time-consuming and error prone
Automated configuration of components and systems follows high-level policies. Rest of system adjusts automatically and seamlessly
Self-optimization
Systems have hundreds of manually set nonlinear tuning parameters, and their number increases with each release
Components and systems continually seek opportunities to improve their own performance and efficiency
Self-healing
Problem determination in large, complex systems can take a team of programmers weeks
System automatically detects, diagnoses, and repairs localized software and hardware problems
Self-protections
Detection of and recovery from attacks and cascading failures is manual
System automatically defends against malicious attacks or cascading failures. It uses early warning to anticipate and prevent systemwide failures
