Initially complicated but well worth the effort.
April 30, 2021

Initially complicated but well worth the effort.

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with OpenNMS

We use OpenNMS to monitor all aspects of our networks, identify issues and to alert us of any problems. The level of detail is great, and we can often spot and deal with potential issues before they actually manifest as a problem. When we do find ourselves with a network critical issue, OpenNMS alerts us within seconds and tells us where to look. Once you have everything running, you will wonder why you didn't do it sooner.
  • Can monitor practically anything. Service availability, performance, latency, network interfaces, routing, hardware, and so on, and via different methods. If you need to monitor something on your network, you almost certainly can with OpenNMS.
  • The OpenNMS web-based dashboard is very comprehensive and offers a ton of detail, covering everything you are monitoring. The ability to get a reassuring overview of the entire network is great, and to be able to whittle down the data to specifics, is a game changer.
  • OpenNMS has a great online community, with a massive amount of support available via countless forums, blogs, YouTube, etc. If you get stuck on an issue, you'll find someone who's been there, done that, and detailed a resolution.
  • Available free and open-source (with paid support and plans available for those who require it).
  • It takes a fair amount of experimentation to fine tune information collection.
  • Configuration can be quite cumbersome with a steep learning curve. It would be nice if more of this could be done via the web dashboard.
  • The reliance on Java will put some users off. However, in fairness, it does mean it runs on a wide variety of hardware.
  • Free and open-source.
  • Ability to monitor practically any device or service on our networks.
  • Comprehensive web based dashboard provides a wealth of information and ongoing 'health' check.
  • Initial adoption required quite a lot of resources and time to get everything right. Totally worth it for us; just be prepared for a gradual process that will get better and better with time.
  • Once setup and running smoothly, it provides us with all the reporting we could hope for, at near zero cost.
  • With OpenNMS, we're able to offer a much more reliable service to our customers, and spend a lot less time dealing with issues.
Although Grafana is in no way an alternative to OpenNMS's full functionality, it can be integrated with other solutions (including OpenNMS itself) to offer the graphing and data visualisation aspects of OpenNMS. In this regard, Grafana is more flexible, and some would say prettier, than OpenNMS's graphing. For the best of both worlds, I'd recommend using them both!

Do you think OpenNMS Meridian delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with OpenNMS Meridian's feature set?

Yes

Did OpenNMS Meridian live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of OpenNMS Meridian go as expected?

No

Would you buy OpenNMS Meridian again?

Yes

I would recommend all system administrators use some form of network monitoring if they are not already doing so, and I'd definitely recommend people consider OpenNMS if they're shopping around. Small businesses will benefit from the low-cost of entry (it's free!), whilst getting all the enterprise features. Larger businesses can benefit from paid support plans.

However, there's no getting around the fact that you will require some advanced networking and sysadmin knowledge to get the most out of OpenNMS, or at least, be prepared for a steep learning curve. If you don't have the resources to devote this time initially, you may struggle.