IBM Netcool Operations Insight Reviews

Summary: I like to think of this product as such:

If you want to run your operations like every other business out there, with the same limitations, impact exposure, and mttr/mttd expectations, go with a cheaper and easier solution.

However, if you want to differentiate yourself from every other competitor out their by tailoring a solution to your specific business needs and experience better outcomes for customers that rely on your services (whether those customers are internal or external), go with Netcool, and pay the premium both in licensing and in effort.

Positive: Anything you can dream of is possible with this product. In contrast to many solutions out on the marketplace today (2021), there is nothing in Netcool that limits you in configuring/customizing the solution for your business needs.

Negative: The pro is also a con. The product is fairly complex, and at times, unintuitive. A lot of configuration/customization is done in text files on the file system. Rules for formatting events are powerful, with excellent parsing and regex capabilities, but you must have an administrator with general regex and logic knowledge to tailor the system to your business. These days, however, junior people with these skills are pretty easy to find.