IT operations costs are accelerating, and today'sincreasingly complex architectures and distributed computinginfrastructures only make matters worse. The solution: autonomiccomputing. Autonomic systems are self-configuring, self-healing,self-optimizing, and self-protecting. They operate intelligently anddynamically, acting on your policies and service requirements. This bookpresents everything IT leaders and managers need to know to prepare forautonomic computing - and to begin leveraging its benefits.Coverage includes:* How autonomic computing can reduce costs, improve servicelevels, enhance agility, simplify management, and help deliver the "ondemand" business* The key elements and attributes of autonomiccomputing systems* Current autonomic technologies from IBM andmany other leading suppliers* Autonomic computing architectures, open standards, development tools, and enablers* Implementation considerations, including a new assessmentmethodology* The future of autonomic computing: businessopportunities and research challenges"