Ciscoworks LMS 4.0 End of Life Announced

Cisco has put the kibosh on Cisco Works LMS 4.0! In a recent End of Life announcement, the dates for it's final life span have been laid out. That's right, the age old product that sales managers insist on bundling with everything they sell is now going by the wayside. And for most of you out there you are probably sighing in relief. But don't get too comfy with the thought of Cisco Works' demise, it really isn't going away.

Cisco Prime is the latest and greatest network management software package coming from the bowels of Cisco's application development group. In all reality it just looks like they renamed the product from Cisco Works to Cisco Prime and slapped a new GUI on it. Maybe we won't notice? (keep crossing your fingers Cisco). That's sort of the truth, but I've got an inside scoop, so keep reading if you want to know more.

While at Cisco Live last month, the speaker at one of the sessions I attended provided some information on the transition of Cisco Works to Cisco Prime. Do you remember that whole reorganization from earlier this year? That has had some impacts on how things are getting done internally, it wasn't just a weak attempt at improving the stock price. Here's some of the changes:

• The development group that used to work on Cisco Works has been reorganized under a new management structure and new talent has been placed on the project.
• Also, they are no longer taking a piecemeal approach to developing the product (CS, DFM, RME, etc), they are rewriting the product piece by piece.

Now, what does this mean for Cisco Works customers today? Basically the name has changed and the GUI is a little cleaned up. However, don't write this one off just yet. In the coming months and years, expect to see a dramatic departure from the LMS we know today. They are "recycling" the core LMS discovery components and some key features from LMS and the sub-modules, but they will be developing Prime as if it were one homogenous application, rewriting it from the ground up!

So, in the not so distant future, Cisco Prime will have a sleek user interface and a lot of changes under the hood that hopefully make it a viable network management tool. (Maybe it's us that should be crossing our fingers).