De Montfort University has
chosen Novell Open Enterprise Server 2 as the foundation for its IT
infrastructure for students and staff. The Novell system, built on
the SUSE
Linux Enterprise Server SP1 operating system, is designed to
reduce storage costs, and using Novell's Xen virtualisation
technology, improve resilience and flexibility.
The university is one of the largest in the UK, with more than
20,000 students and 3,000 staff across two campuses in Leicester,
and offers 400 undergraduate and postgraduate courses.
Because the IT infrastructure at De Montfort had been managed by
individual departments, a number of different systems had developed
independently of one another with poor integration. A lack of
centralisation for data and services and fragmentation of the
infrastructure made it hard for students and staff to work and
share information effectively.
Novell's network management software, together with the Linux
operating system, created a single point of access to applications
and information for all staff and students.
Following the successful implementation of Novell Open
Enterprise Server, Novell eDirectory and Novell Identity Manager a
few years ago, the university had a stable platform that permitted
all users to access all relevant resources from any computer. As
the next step, the university wanted to improve the flexibility,
efficiency and scalability of the infrastructure, with tiered data
storage and to begin to exploit server virtualisation
technologies.
Last year, De Montfort University finished implementing a
three-node Linux cluster with Novell Cluster Services on Novell
Open Enterprise Server 2 on Intel-based servers. The cluster will
provide file and print services to a growing number of students and
academics as the university migrates from NetWare. The university
worked with NDS8, an IT services firm, to implement the new
system.
"The main driver for upgrading to the new version of Novell Open
Enterprise Server was to push the adoption of Linux at the core of
our infrastructure," said Chris Semmens, IT team leader at De
Montfort University. "The usual cost argument for Linux is
relatively unimportant from our point of view - it is much more
about scalability, security, robustness, high performance and the
ability to run on practically any hardware."
De Montfort University is improving storage capacity and
performance by automating the movement of inactive data from
high-performance discs to lower-cost discs based on preset
policies. After a set period, the Novell system archives inactive
data from the fibre-channel disks on the University's Hitachi San
to the Sata discs on a newly implemented IBM System Storage DS3300
storage array with iSCSI connections.
"Dynamic Storage Technology in Novell Open Enterprise Server has
given us a transparent second tier of storage, enabling us to
reduce the cost of storing inactive data in a way that is
transparent to the users," said Semmens. "We then only need to back
up the data from the lower-cost devices on a monthly basis, as it
is largely static."
Stored data could be from any of the university's activities.
Administrative staff use the system, students use it to produce
coursework and lecturers to develop course materials. In terms of
the actual data, this is anything including word processing
documents, financial spreadsheets and presentation documents.
De Montfort University is now testing Xen virtualisation on SUSE
Linux Enterprise, and hopes to create a Novell iPrint system to
improve printing speed and resilience. "Virtualisation will allow
us to abstract services from the hardware on which they run,
enabling non-disruptive infrastructure upgrades and improved
disaster recovery options," said Semmens.
"The Novell system has improved the resilience of core services
and enabled us to adopt Linux at the centre of our infrastructure,"
said Semmens.
Using open source Xen virtualisation technology integrated in
SUSE Linux Enterprise, De Montfort was also able to upgrade its
infrastructure with minimal or even zero impact on users, he said.
Virtualisation enabled faster recovery in the event of a disaster,
as well as allowing more efficient use of hardware, power and floor
space, he said.
Novell said virtualisation of the Linux operating system lowers
hardware, maintenance and electrical costs. It also helps use
excess storage capacity and improve response times by balancing
computing loads across server system resources at peak times.
Meanwhile, applications could be moved between hardware systems
without altering them, according to the software firm.
The Linux, Novell and virtualisation technologies would have
knock-on environmental benefits for the university, Semmens said.
"The university is committed to reducing its carbon footprint, and
virtualisation will have an important role to play. With Xen, we
will reduce the total number of servers we run, and technologies
such as Novell ZENworks Orchestrator will enable us to move
services and power down servers when demand falls, helping to
reduce power consumption."