Rules of Deployment: The Life Cycle of a Converged Network
A major shift in telecommunications from circuit to packet switched technology, along with increasing sophistication of the corporate LAN/WAN, is prompting businesses of all sizes to consider merging their voice and data networks. Increased bandwidth availability through gigabit Ethernet and fiber trunk lines allow for telephony to be treated as any other application on the IP network, albeit a very needy one.
Whereas the main motivation for individual consumers to make the switch to VoIP may be cost, as evidenced by the acceptance of such upstarts as Vonage, for businesses, the transition to IP telephony (IPT) could mean a costly network upgrade, fueled by aging or depreciated legacy PBX equipment.
The upside is the imediate potential of adding strategic business capabilities – a triple play of voice, video, and data – and future proofing the network for a host of real and non realtime applications under the concept called Unified Communications. Data and communications, all managed and maintained over one network instead of two.
The Life Cycle of an IPT Network
Just like any major network undertaking, best practices dictate that deployment take place in stages, the success of each successive phase depending on the previous. The first stage is planning and assessment, followed by an intense pre deployment testing and implementation stage, and once the migration has taken place, the ongoing operations and optimizations stage. Taken together, these phases of deployment are what is known as the converged IPT network life cycle.
Planning and Assessment: Business Drivers
The business case for convergence must be clear from the beginning. Why trash a perfectly functioning telephone network with a reliable reputation for a new, burgeoning technology, as of yet only minimally tested? If indeed your existing phone system is out of date, replacement parts are getting hard to find, or its functionality no longer suits the needs of a growing organization, one motivation for converging could be the unwillingness to invest in a new Centrex-centric PBX, based on circuit switched technology.
Managing Expectations
A successful deployment from start to finish should take about a year, with a good 6 months devoted to planning and testing. For organizations that have recently upgraded their network infrastructure, deploying a converged network may not be as costly as networks that are older, and require major renovation.
Realistically, it has been observed that migrating from a legacy PBX to an IP PBX will cost as least as much as buying a new TDM PBX. Where you may get your ROI is on moves, adds, and changes (MAC) in the new IP environment. Studies show that MAC on a TDM system averages about $65, vs. $10 on an IP PBX.
Equally important is managing the expectations of your end users. Let them know early on about deployment plans and keep them apprised of your progress. End users should be surveyed on what aspects of the current system they consider critical to their job functions, and what improvements they would like to see in the new system. Call and voice quality are understandably critical factors to users and like the carrier network you are about to replace, Service Level Agreements (SLA) play an important role to insure acceptable customer service.
Planning for Security
Security considerations are of utmost importance in the planning phase. Treat your PBXs as any other critical application server by keeping it protected from public access, perhaps even in it’s own DMZ. Remember that an IP PBX has all the vulnerabilities of IP, and it opens up a whole new Pandora’s Box with a connection to the PSTN. Firewalls and intrusion detection should be utilized appropriately and should be current enough to recognize voice traffic.
Also consider segregating your voice traffic through the use of virtual LANs. A VLAN can help increase network performance while having the added benefit of enhanced security.
Hosted vs. In-house
Early consideration should be given to the options available for the type of voice network to deploy, as well as who will be responsible for the deployment. For businesses simply wanting to implement a VoIP solution, a hosted IP PBX can leap frog you into the future, while saving on equipment costs and reducing the headaches associated with a long drawn out deployment process.
For organizations looking to future proof their network, vendor equipment must be chosen and assessed, as well as the management applications being considered for the deployment. Costs associated with upgrading the skill sets of the IT and/or Telephony staff must also be taken into consideration.
Calling in the Pros
Organizations that plan to migrate to IP telephony themselves but find they lack the necessary expertise, might consider bringing in a Systems Integrator to help with the deployment. A Systems Integrator should be chosen and brought in early in the project. They should work closely with the IT department and can also take on the role of trainer in getting them up to speed on the new technology. The cost of bringing in an outsider can be upwards of 20% of the entire project, but may be worth it to assure a seamless transition.
The Managed Service Provider
A growing trend in the industry is for businesses to offload all or part of VoIP deployment responsibilities to a Managed Service Provider. Carriers, equipment vendors, and professional services that now have a couple of years of experience in the field are finding that companies are willing to pay for their expertise. For businesses that find that their IT staff is not up to the task, or could be utilized better elsewhere, an MSP provides the option of outsourcing projects anywhere from doing the network assessment and capacity planning, to taking on the whole ongoing management phase, much like business was doing with their legacy telephony service providers.
Management Solutions
For the enterprise that is planning to leave it up to the IT and Communications departments, now is the time to consider third party management and analysis applications. Third party solutions are just now coming into the market that take a more holistic approach to management, looking at the effects of both real time and not so real time applications on the network as a whole. Solutions being considered should be assessed for their usefulness in the testing stage of deployment. More on these management applications in the ongoing operations and optimization part of this paper.
Michael Talbert is a certified systems engineer with over 7 years experience in the industry. For more information on VoIP and IP Telephony, visit the website http://VoIP-Facts.net, or the VoIP Facts Blog at http://voip-facts.net/voip-blog for up to date industry news and commentary.
Rules of Deployment: Inventory of Assets and Existing Capabilities
Inventory of Assets: Know what you have to work with by taking a full inventory of all your network hardware including switches, routers, servers, existing PBX’s, cabling and end user equipment. Make sure to take note of their processing power and throughput capabilities, as well as any nodes that are not VoIP aware. Also be sure to document router OS versions and WAN connections to the Internet.
You may find that some equipment may need to be upgraded, refurbished, or retired. For hardware that is not suitable on one segment, look for other areas in your organization where you can reuse your existing equipment, perhaps a branch office with older assets that does not need to be deployed any time soon.
Also take a good look at all of your business applications, their versions, and any patches or upgrades that need to be rolled out. Now is the time to decide which applications you can do without and get rid of the clutter, and to bring in any new or upgraded versions of applications critical to you business needs. Get current with all the patches available for apps and operating systems as well.
Take the opportunity at this point to assess your current telephony environment, such as call center configurations, slow, normal, and busy calling patterns, connection times, inter/intra office call patterns. All the information you gather about your current calling environment will be used to set the bench marks and determine SLAs in the new converged environment. Inventory all of your current voice equipment to determine their usability and depreciation schedules. During deployment, you will more than likely want to keep an old PBX or two as a backup.
The Network Assessment: One of the most important steps in planning for voice is the Network Readiness Assessment. Most VoIP vendors will provide a network assessment for you in order to determine the parts of an existing network that require an upgrade to produce an acceptable level of call quality.
For companies that plan to manage their own ongoing operations, network assessment tools are available, and indeed should be part of your overall network analysis software solution. Whereas the first network assessment in the planning stage is to determine where you may need to upgrade, subsequent assessments should be made periodically on a monthly or quarterly basis to see how changes in the network are affecting performance.
Assessment tools are hardware or software based, with software being the preferable method as the entire network can be assessed from a centralized location. A software tool will send agents throughout the LAN and over WAN connections to remote locations, simulating voice traffic to determine how many VoIP calls a location can handle based on QoS and MOS indicators.
The initial assessment for VoIP readiness should be made throughout an entire business cycle. Simulate peak calling times for different locations, and assess other business applications that reside on the network as to how they will react with the additional voice traffic, as well as their affect on call quality and QoS.
It has been noted in the industry that fully 50% of IPT deployments that neglect to do a network assessment end up in failed deployments, many of them spending money on upgrading their networks were they thought they needed it, instead of where they knew they needed it.
For some smaller businesses, convergence could be as simple and cheap as installing an Asterix PBX system on a dedicated machine, or using a peer to peer network such as Skype to communicate between branch offices. For businesses that maintain their own infrastructure, failure to plan, test and assess for IPT will surely result in a failed deployment marred with dropped calls, unacceptable call quality and connection times, and potential disruptions of your companies other critical business applications.
Michael Talbert is a certified systems engineer with over 7 years experience in the industry. For more information on VoIP and IP Telephony, visit the website http://VoIP-Facts.net, or the VoIP Facts Blog at http://voip-facts.net/voip-blog for up to date industry news and commentary.
Know More About Load Balancing
Load balancing, by definition, is the process of spreading the amount of work that is conducted by a computer system between a number of different computer systems to increase the speed that the work is completed in. There are several different methods in which load balancing can be accomplished by and the technique can use many different types of computer components, including both hardware and software applications. Load balancing is typically completed using a cluster of computer servers that may or may not be located in the same location.
There are many different companies that see the benefits of using this process and implement the procedure for their companies. Companies that conduct business transactions in large numbers using the internet are prime candidates to use this method to ensure that all of their clients and customers will be able to conduct their transactions quickly and accurately. Companies that need to network a great deal of computers for individual users also typically use this to ensure that all computers will work properly and have the right amount of power to be able to perform the functions that they are intended to perform. It also ensures that the company will still be able to do business if one server becomes corrupted or goes down for an extended period of time.
There are several different methods that are widely used for load balancing. One of the most popular methods is Global Server Load Balancing. This technique distributes the incoming tasks to a group of servers in a particular geographic location. This technique is widely used by companies that have a global presence and have a need to satisfy customers or employees in many different geographical locations. Using Global Server Load Balancing ensures that the work load is distributed throughout the entire server system in an easy to manage manner and ensures that all geographical locations are obtaining the correct information from the correct set of servers.
Another load balancing technique that is commonly used is called Persistence Load Balancing. This technique assigns each new client to a different server in a round robin type of allocation. This client is then assigned to this specific server for the future of their relationship with the business. This ensures that no one server is overloaded with a particular type of client, such as those in a certain geographical area or use a specific type of service and ensures that the clients are distributed evenly through out all of the servers that the business possesses. These server assignments are typically monitored by using the customers IP address as the customer’s unique identification code.
Fusepoint is a full suite of managed IT services including: Managed Hosting and Infrastructure, Application Services, Disaster Recovery and Professional Services. Fusepoint sees the benefits of using load balancing and implement the procedure for their clients.
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Wire Your House for Multi-Media
Structured wiring is a new, but very important concept in the residential construction industry. In fact just as one does not buy a home without any indoor plumbing or central heating today, pretty soon, no one will buy a home without any structured wiring.
With structured writing, it is possible to interconnect PCs and printers around the house so that there is file sharing and the possibility of sending information from one PC to another room or printer. In addition to connectivity between PCs and printers, structured wiring also provides for distribution of television, DVD and VCR programming in the home. With this, you can watch a movie in your bedroom while the movie is playing in the player found in your living room.
In addition to providing convenience with movies and the computer, with structured wiring, there is no need of re-wiring when you have to add new services, systems and electronic devices to your home. This is because the structured wiring accommodates additional devices and new devices that are yet to be invented.
Of course, the best time to install structured wiring is during the construction of a home so that you can decide on the placing of ports and wiring. It also avoids the expense of disturbing the walls and base boards for installation of structured wiring after the home is finished. This is referred to as “retro-fitting” that is opted for by those considering installing structured wiring in existing homes.
The basic components of a home structured wiring system consist of the distribution panel, high performance cabling and multi-media outlets. The distribution panel is usually found in the closet or attic and serves in terminating service provider services in the house and distributes signals to different parts of the house. Even audio, video and camera sources can be delivered here for distribution in the house. With an electrical power source in the distribution panel, it is possible to provide power to powered devices found in the panel.
The high performance cables run from the distribution panel to each location in the house for distribution of signals and are also needed in the installation to signal sources like motion detectors and security camera. The multi-media outlets are the plug and play points that are found throughout the house to provide outlets for internet, telephone, DBS, HDTV, cable TV, security camera and digital audio.
So it can be seen that structured wiring in your home provides the necessary infrastructure to deploy both current and future home technology.
I have been a structured wiring expert for almost 10 years now. We have come a long way and with the introduction of CAT6 wire we are living in the future as far as this technology is concerned. Learn more…
Kip D Goldhammer owns and operates http://www.networkcableinformation.com