These tools are flexible aids for configuring a cluster of managed nodes.
System administrators can define tools to copy files or execute processes.
In the service-control environment, system administrators can define roles, such as database administrator or Web administator, that the administrators can associate with given tools. The authorization facility of the service-control management system associates users with roles and nodes within a managed system. With authorizations in place, administrators can execute ServiceControl Manager tools from the central management station, and the tool facility can automatically determine on which managed nodes the tool is authorized to execute and will direct the tool to execute on those managed nodes. Donald Suit is a software engineer at Hewlett-Packard's UNIX Development Lab in Fort Collins, Colorado. He has over 19 years of software development experience developing various commercial and government applications.