KUALA LUMPUR: Blue Coat Systems Inc, a technology leader in application delivery networking, has an enhanced version of software for its PacketShaper appliances.

It said PacketShaper 8.5 appliances provide a new level of integrated application visibility, enhanced application intelligence and policy-based control, that together bring application accountability to the enterprise network.

Application accountability enables businesses to better assure the quality of bandwidth-hungry business-critical applications and communication, including telephony and videoconferencing, while controlling usage of increasingly taxing recreational applications.

The PacketShaper 8.5 release uses integrated workflows to enable more detailed application understanding with real-time monitoring, historical reporting and policy-based QoS (quality of service) controls.

It provides an intuitive, fully integrated workspace that visually shows critical application behaviour and displays the immediate effect of applied QoS through an intuitive user interface.

Similar applications can be automatically grouped together in class-of-service categories, such as peer-to-peer, games or instant messaging, for ease of management.

In addition to that, PacketShaper appliances now provide more granular visibility and control over voice, video and virtualised applications.

“Despite the many types of security appliances and packet filters on the market, application identification and control continue to be an Achilles heel for large organisations,” said Jon Oltsik, principal analyst at the Enterprise Strategy Group.

“Blue Coat’s new release of PacketShaper addresses this issue by providing concise analysis of the actual application traffic traversing the network and offering management tools for application control.

“Armed with these capabilities, IT and security professionals can make intelligent decisions about controlling applications.”

Application accountability

This is now possible due to the combination of existing PacketShaper technology with the addition of integrated workflows.

The result is application visibility based on greater application intelligence, including understanding application behaviour over a period of time and across a flow of packets rather than basing an assessment on a single packet at a single instance of time.

It also takes into consideration peaks or surges in bandwidth demands, as well as the sustained or average consumption and behaviour, and overcomes the limitations of conventional deep-packet inspection.

“Businesses need to understand what applications are consuming network capacity so that they can align network resources with business priorities,” said Jeff Barker, vice-president of solutions and technical marketing at Blue Coat.

“PacketShaper appliances now provide application accountability to enhance the quality of business-critical applications and communication while providing the means for companies to regain network control.”

Enhanced intelligence

PacketShaper 8.5 can automatically identify voice traffic and distinguish between different devices or applications using voice, even if the same protocols and codec are used for both. For instance, PacketShaper can distinguish between a call using a specific make or model of an enterprise VoIP (Voice-over-Internet Protocol) phone system and a consumer voice application, such as e-mail or instant messaging with voice support.

Policies to support quality of voice calls can now be applied to the enterprise phone system rather than to individual software applications used by employees.

In addition, the new PacketShaper release offers the ability to specifically identify and manage voice and video within Microsoft Live Meeting or Office Communications Server (OCS).

Blue Coat’s PacketShaper appliances, combined with ProxySG appliances, are the foundation of an Application Delivery Network for optimising and securing the flow of information to any user on any network, anywhere.

Application Delivery Networks start with application visibility to determine exactly what is running over the WAN (wide area network) or Internet gateway and treat it according to policy.

The ability to determine the exact application and whether it is business-critical, recreational or malicious is essential to maintaining the quality of important applications while managing or curtailing recreational or malicious ones.

Availability

PacketShaper 8.5 is available now as a free software upgrade to existing PacketShaper customers with current support contracts.

For more information, visit www.bluecoat.com.