Much has been said aboutnetwork optimisationrecently. The
expected onslaught of new wave applications - so called at least -
such asVoIP,IPTVand the rest, means that we do
have to optimise and re-architect our networks if this stuff is
actually going to be deliverable at acceptable quality levels, says
Steve Broadhead, director ofBroadband-Testing
Labs.
However, much of this talk is aimed at deployments at service
provider or enterprise levels. So, what about the small business or
branch office - do these guys not require some level of
optimisation too? Historically, possibly not. If all they were
doing was running some kind of Office application suite and little
beyond that, other than e-mail and web browsing, then it's
difficult to see exactly what could be optimised, other than
themselves of course, but we'll come back to that one.
Regarding the mass take-up of real-time applications such as
VoIP - why would a small business not wish to take advantage of
cheap or free calls? Similarly, Internet/video conferencing makes a
lot of sense for interaction between multiple small businesses
where budget is restricted. At the same time just because a
business is small or of the branch office variety it doesn't mean
that it is not a very high value business with the same critical
reliance on a network as a multi-billion dollar multi-national
company (remember these - they existed before "global" ones).
So, let us define what optimisation means for these companies -
performance, yes, but also reliability, flexibility and user
control. Let's start with the latter. There is little doubt that a
user's worst enemy is often themselves. In a scenario where there
is no electronic nanny to protect them, all too often a user will
find themselves in difficulties of their own making hence the
existence of anti-virus products, website advisor services and
other related methods of preventing a user from infecting their PC
and losing valuable data. However, many of these products and
services are aimed at protecting the user purely from the vagaries
of the internet, rather than the internal network or simply the
contents of the PC or laptop that user has.
It is all very well for a network administrator to document what
applications and services a user should have access to and which
they should not, but what if there is no way of controlling or
policing those policies - a classic small business or branch office
problem?
Similarly, a user should also be protected from technology
overload while being allowed to know if their PC or laptop is
running as it should, whether it is free of
malicious content, or be warned if potential problems are
arising. We investigated this area when we worked with
NewNetTechnologies and its Remote Angel product - essentially an
automated first line of support with lots of white-listing options
for tying down users to a very exact set of applications and
services.
In terms of providing uptime, this kind of user protection is
every bit as important as integrated redundancy and resiliency in
the network devices being deployed. Performance on a wired LAN -
given the incredibly low cost of
Gigabit Ethernet switch ports these days - shouldn't be a
general problem, but downtime still is. That said, if the mix of
applications is many and varied, and deployments of VoIP and other
delicate traffic types are increasing, then a level of control is
required if we are to guarantee quality delivery of those
applications.
While many of even the budget switches have some kind of
integrated QoS, actually setting up this stuff is likely to be
beyond most small business users, while still not necessarily
providing the levels of control they need.
Recently, we looked at a version of
Zeus' ZXTM
traffic controller within a virtualised environment. The idea
here is that, by running a Layer 4-7 optimisation product as a
virtual application on a bog standard server platform, it makes
true LAN traffic management a reality for the small business.
Even I was sceptical about pulling this one off, but we proved
that it is entirely possible to run ZXTM in a virtualised
environment alongside other applications on the same server. So
where out and out performance is less of an issue than data
management and manipulation, ZXTM can be a very cost-effective
add-on to an existing application server environment.
Dave Asprey, VP Marketing for Zeus, says: "We see LAN
optimisation as a challenge for small businesses because vendors
often provide low functionality and low performance gear without
fault tolerance in order to meet the price point that a small
business can afford. This is a major problem because small
businesses actually need high functionality, but not the high
performance required by a large enterprise. And who says small
businesses don't care about high availability? Of course they do,
but until recently, there was not a way for them to afford
redundancy within a budget."
Asprey believes that the emergence of the virtual appliance -
something that can be deployed on existing Windows servers and take
advantage of any excess computing power - is the way forward for
small business network optimisation.
"This way a small business gets the same high availability and
high functionality that big enterprises get, and more than enough
performance, but they do it without wasting money on more
hardware," he says.
Earlier, I mentioned flexibility and by that I mean the ability
to work as and when you need to. In last month's article for
Computer Weekly I spoke about being always connected outside the
LAN in relation to testing I had just carried out with
Brand Communications and,
before that, our testing with DBAM Systems and the fantastic
acceleration and traffic control we achieved over the WAN, but that
is primarily outside of the office. So what about within it?
Well here is where a WLAN really does make a lot of sense, as a
natural extension to the wired network, meaning far easier
deployments - no cables running everywhere. Obviously, we are not
talking deployment of high-end, enterprise-oriented WLAN solutions
here, but even at the SMB level there are some tricks to look for,
that will optimise the WLAN within a small business
environment.
For example, ProCurve's snappily-named 530ww Access Point has a
simple trick: two radios - meaning that both 54Mbps 802.11a and
802.11g IEEE standards can be supported concurrently, on different
radios within the same AP. Alternatively, both radios can be set to
802.11b/g and coverage can be optimised using external antennae if
required, though the product comes, as standard, with dual
internal, omni-directional antennae. So it is a doddle to deploy
and requires little in the way of day-to-day management, keeping
operating costs right down - another point of optimisation, in this
case at the real bottom line.
Regarding network management and administration, another element
to look at is in delivering core network services such as DNS,
DHCP, IP Address Management and centralised
security/authentication, using something like RADIUS. Typically
this stuff is done manually, but is again prone to human error and
costly downtime. So it might be worth taking a look at another
appliance solution such as those provided by Infoblox.
Though originally aimed at the enterprise and far too expensive
to be considered for most small business deployments, the company
has now introduced an entry-level product that it claims to be no
more expensive to acquire than the manual equivalent - a server
plus software - and considerably less expensive to run on a daily
basis. The new generation of applications such as VoIP and video -
in its various forms - are being applied in the small
businesses.
The uptake of applications such as IP Telephony and longer term,
potentially video, is being driven equally by the small business
keen to gain competitive edge. Smaller businesses tend to have more
mobile workforces, and so remote access and mobility are often key
drivers for these technologies. These need optimising in a way that
traditional data applications don't.
As with traditional data applications, bandwidth is becoming
more critical as the uptake of these applications increase,
something that the scaling of technologies such as Gigabit Ethernet
is helping to address, says Dave Smith, VP Business Solutions at
D-Link Europe.
Smith says: "However, whereas most data applications don't care
if bandwidth is shared or transmissions interrupted, some
applications - for example VoIP and video - are very sensitive to
latency, particularly when smaller businesses often rely on public
offerings once they are outside of their network (e.g. DSL links
from an ISP into their business). Traffic also needs to be
prioritised and delivered in a reliable and timely fashion."
The point to understand is, for small business and branch office
environments, optimisation comes in many shapes and forms, so don't
just think performance.