Open Source MonitoringForge

SAN FRANCISCO—September 15, 2009—GroundWork Open Source, Inc. (GWOS, ), the leader in commercial open source systems and network management software, today announced the launch of www.MonitoringForge.org, the epicenter of all open source projects that relate to IT monitoring.

MonitoringForge is designed to appeal to IT administrators who want to compare and understand the differences between various open source monitoring tools and plugins available today, facilitating the selection of open source monitoring software over proprietary offerings.

Additionally, MonitoringForge provides a unified, professional project and plugin listing for all open source solutions involving monitoring. This web platform is designed to give the project developer control of how their material is presented and managed.

For fledgling open source projects or plugins that have no community websites, MonitoringForge can be configured to run all of their project elements including:

• Download package management supporting a variety of iterations
• Subversioning, tracking and code submission enabling a multi-developer practice
• Open source licensing management
• Project review and rankings by users sharing first hand experiences
• Q&A;, roadmap and bug tracking connecting user feedback directly to the developers
• Screenshot gallery to preview the application
• Wiki, Documentation, newsfeeds and forums to share best practices
• Meta-tagging and search friendly descriptions for easy identification
• Project based security so the project admin can choose if the project is publicly available, private, and who are the contributors.

For mature, open source projects that have existing community sites, MonitoringForge can become a “pass-through” traffic aggregator, sending users to the project’s originating sites. This “pass-through” feature reduces developer maintenance of multiple sites and lowers the confusion for users on the latest activity.

“MonitoringForge is the rising tide that raises all ships. Inspired by IT admins who search multiple discussion boards or project developer sites trying to find answers and insight, MonitoringForge is the first website to fulfill a real need for an open source monitoring hub connecting tools with users and advice,” said Tara Spalding, vice president of Marketing for GWOS. “All projects are welcome on MonitoringForge. The more participation, the better understanding users will have of what open source monitoring can do.”

The beta site publicly launches with more than 1,700 open source projects and plugins, giving users have an immediate ready-to-go toolset when they visit MonitoringForge. MonitoringForge intends to have community driven governance, and is immediately assembling an advisory board to further harden the agnostic approach for project presentation and participation.

About MonitoringForge.org

MonitoringForge.org (www.monitoringforge.org) is the epicenter of all open source projects that relate to IT monitoring. Any participant, project or company is welcome to contribute to the MonitoringForge community. As the first Website to provide a common community for core developers of IT monitoring, MonitoringForge believes users can inspire an open standard and cross platform integration, so that network and systems monitoring tools becomes more efficient and less expensive.

About GroundWork Open Source (GWOS)

San Francisco-based GWOS (http://www.gwos.com) is the market leader in commercial open source network and systems management software, delivering enterprise-class network, system and application management solutions at a fraction of the cost of proprietary solutions.

GWOS's best of breed approach gives customers the flexibility to use diverse open source and proprietary technologies together under a unified interface, allowing users to leverage the advantages of open source while simultaneously preserving existing investments in legacy management tools. GWOS’s solutions are in use at organizations like Crocs, National Australia Bank, Siemens, Travel Click and World Bank.