AutoSys Workload Automation Reviews

Enterprise job scheduling.

It has helped to simplify cross-dependency between MVS and Open systems jobs.

Also adding new agents is easy, scheduling is easier and faster.

• Enterprise cross-platform scheduling
• MVS scheduling

We have couple of hundred thousand jobs scheduled monthly via ESP so it is critical.

Reduce the number of operational files. This would make the job of a system programmer supporting ESP easier. In the present design, there are too many operational files to maintain.

No issues with stability.

No issues with scalability.

I would rate them nine and a half out of 10. CA technical support is doing a great job.

We had to choose an alternate scheduling tool.

It is relatively simple.

Great tool, excellent technical support, stable product.

We use CA Workload Automation AE r11.3.6 to automate enterprise-wide scheduling and file transfers using an FTP plugin.

It has improved my organization by automating IT applications. The solution is used to invoke scripts and batches across multiple systems and the dependency is managed.

Administering with the command line: The feature creates similar jobs in bulk using the command line.                                                                                                                                                               

• Managing agents centrally (installing, changing configuration, starting and stopping, and upgrading).
• The WCC could be improved.

We use it for batch processing. We're a service bureau, so a number of our customers contract with us to use it for mainframe batch processing.

There are certain batch jobs that need to run on a regular basis in order for our customers to receive reports and updates, and CA-7 provides that for us. So that improves the function of our agencies.

The ability to create calendars, calendaring for batch jobs to run on a scheduled frequency.

The cross-platform arena, where you can run work on multiple platforms, needs improvement.

Stability is a 10 out of 10.

Scalability is a nine out of 10.

Technical support is a 10 out of 10.

We used punch cards back in 70s and 80s. This is the solution that took over from IBM punch cards.

I did not do the initial setup.

I certainly think the pricing is worth the value.

Evaluate whether it performs all the functions you need for batch processing.

Enterprise job scheduling.

We have worked with CA to better understand all of the security points, the ability to lock the product down so that it's not being abused or exploited in any fashion.

• Flexibility
• Ease of use
• The capabilities of the product to schedule on multiple platforms, multiple operating systems.

Also, over time the CA workload agent has gotten much better. For our organization it's important for us to communicate in a secure fashion between the host and the other platforms, and we are able to do that with our CA product, with ESP.

I would rate it a nine out of 10.

Scalability is a 10 out of 10.

We've completely turned over our scheduling area, and a lot of questions go to CA support. The people in the CA support for ESP have been there for a long time. I know some of them from the time when they worked for Cybermation, and they are very good. I trust their answers.

Tech support is a 10 out of 10.

Back in 2006, we were using CA-7 and we were looking for a product that would do better for scheduling off-platform. We found ESP, which was at that time owned by Cybermation, and we completed migration from CA-7 to ESP, and then shortly after that CA bought ESP. It had to do with scheduling on the distributed platform.

CA-7 was expensive and didn't do distributive work load very well. It was not that flexible. It didn't do everything we needed it to do.

We had Professional Services help us, and it wasn't really that difficult.

We did have onsite training and migration services and we paid for them. It wasn't hard to understand for our people.

I don't really get involved in that part of it. The one thing I would say is that people need to pay attention to how they use their ESP agents on the distributed platform. That's where some of the cost comes in, based on how many you need or how many you use.

At that time CA owned three schedulers and CA-7 was the one we were using. The other two did not necessarily apply to our environment. And there weren't too many others out there. I think we might still have taken a cheap route. We might not of actively compared with other products that were on the market at the time, other than comparing it to CA, and we thought we were getting a good deal.

I believe CA had been actively developing it, enhancing it, and attempting to make it easier to use. I think it's been a good product for us, and I think others would find that to be true as well.

Workload automation and job scheduling.

The graphical interface makes it more accessible to all end-users for monitoring. It also has automated failover, and flexibility in solving job scheduling challenges.

The flexibility allows us to successfully integrate an acquired business’ fiscal close with our own, even though there is a lot of variance as to when they run in the calendar month.

• Easy to use.
• Supports job scheduling on mainframe and distributed systems.

Better documentation with fully explained examples for some of the job types.

No issues with stability.

No issues with scalability.

Excellent support, skilled support technicians.

Old solution did not have a distributed support model that was robust enough.

It was complex. We had to convert our old solution to the new one with no downtime.

I’m not involved with this aspect of the product.

We did not evaluate other options.

This product has allowed us to provide more business value to our company by automating more processes.

We needed to replace Allen Systems Zeke/Zebb back in 2000, since the product was not being updated anymore. ESP met our needs.

It gives us flexibility when doing releases. We can make changes for one day in a PDS member, since we stage our jobs by date, and the next day the normal job definitions are run.

Flexibility of scheduling jobs in PDS members, and not a database, gives you so many more options. ESP is a solid product and works extremely well, it's very reliable. Enhancements are always being added with new features.

You can add jobs/applications/agents in ESP very quickly; it just takes minutes to do.

The GUI/Workstation is weak and needs to be improved. CA is working on this right now; the web based GUI is in beta mode at this time.

ESP is rock solid. It is as reliable as it gets.

No issues with scalability.

Technical support, when it was Cybermation, was much more solid. Now that it's CA, at times the support is excellent and other times it’s not as good.

Allen Systems Zeke/Zebb had issues, and was being sold to different companies at the time. The product did not move forward.

We had Cybermation come in-house to work with us, in doing the conversion back in 2001. It took about one year to convert all of our systems.

CA pricing has been a problem, and not looked upon favorably here at all.

BMC Control-M, IBM TWS.

CA ESP is a solid product and very easy to use. It allows you to be very creative in what you do. It is well liked here and is very easy to learn. The customized views that each individual can create, and ones that can be made free-form, makes this very popular with the programmers.

SME for Cross Platform Agent installation and configuration. We have taken over ownership from the Unix Ops Team for installing, configuring, and administering the Systems Agents. I have also installed and stood up the Web Client. Currently, rolling it out to the general population of our company.

Scheduling workload across multiple platforms from a single point of contact and integration with ERP/ETL type platforms and products, such as Oracle and SEQUEL.

• Flexible agent configurations
• Integration with multiple services and applications across the enterprise.

Sunset CA-7 and stop leading people on with it. 

ESP, Dseries, and now Automic are CA's strategic vision. Not much engineering being done with CA-7 any longer. As a "batch scheduler", it is and always has been a workhorse. As we all know, batch scheduling is antiquated. Workload Automation is the future and changing the product name to CA Workload Automation, CA-7 Edition does not make it a modern WLA Platform.

Mostly its stability.

With requirements, they have "always" and "skip" on them. That would be nice, for them to have it on triggers also. So, if a customer says, "I want to demand this output, only these certain triggers," the scheduler could shut it off.

It's very, very stable. We've never had any problems with it.

I would give scalability a 10 out of 10.

We've used it for a couple of questions when we didn't know the answers. They were great, and very informative. We've even used it for CA Datacom. And since I was a newbie doing upgrades with that, they pretty much held my hand through it, and gave me different suggestions. So, thumbs up to them.

The one that we actually support is the CA-7 Edition for the scheduling package. It's very, very stable, always has been. And we rarely have any problems with it, so that's great.

The important criteria when selecting a vendor include

• that it works with other products
• stability, definitely
• and that it works great in DR.

If I were to advise someone who is looking at this kind of solution, I would say always look at multiple products, and decide from there. I would tell themabout the staple we've had with the CA-7 here, some people may say it's old, pre-historic, but it works great for us.