US Army
Fort Hood, Texas
Challenge: Leverage wireless LAN capabilities to locally access large volumes of equipment maintenance data and digitally transmit maintenance and parts information from repair site to central maintenance management office. System must be mobile and work in wartime outdoor field conditions (e.g., heat, dust, rain) and be easy to set up and uninstall by non-IS professionals. Needs to take less than 30 minutes to set up and provide coverage over a 1KM radius.
Evaluation: The US Army chose a unit at Fort Hood to assess the viability of using wireless LAN technology in a simulated wartime environment in which maintenance personnel, using thin clients, access and transmit maintenance and supply data to a central server. The unit needed to use off-the-shelf solutions to reduce costs and make replacing equipment easy.
Solution: The army's mobile wireless LAN system included a nonruggedized laptop computer server (166MHz, 128MB of RAM, 3GB hard disk) running Citrix WinFrame, an additional 9GB external hard disk (to house Fort Hood's large online technical library), UPS, freestanding wireless radio frequency (RF) repeaters and 500 milliwatt access points (APs) to improve signal coverage, and 10 thin-client CruisePADs. Online applications include Adobe Acrobat Reader 3.0 to let technicians view Portable Document Format (PDF) files and an army-developed maintenance and repair application.
The thin-client CruisePADs were configured with monotransflective screens that let mechanics clearly see the screen in bright sunlight. For nighttime use, the CruisePADs employed backlighting. Each CruisePAD has a protective wraparound cover and a ruggedized transit case to protect the equipment in transit. During deployment operations, the unit keeps all environmentally sensitive equipment, such as the server, external hard disk, APs, and UPS, in a vehicle-mounted shelter.
Results: The army tested the system by deploying the Fort Hood maintenance unit from Texas to reestablish maintenance operations at the army's national training center in California's Mojave Desert. No major system failures occurred throughout the 2-week test. The complete system solution significantly improved data access and transmission efficiency, and the thin clients performed well in the harsh outdoor environment. The life of a battery charge ran approximately 6 hours to 8 hours, which was adequate for the unit's daily needs. However, the memory requirements of loading an Adobe Acrobat session (approximately 14MB of RAM per client), meant that the unit could place no more than six thin clients in operation without causing response delays or freezing.
Recommendation: Lieutenant Colonel Mark Melius, the army's project officer, believes that with proper configuration and equipment selection, wireless LAN technology can be used in the harsh environments that manufacturing or construction operations face. Using thin clients greatly reduces the incidence of hard disks crashing, dirt in keyboards, and end-user futzing. "This stuff works," Melius said. He recommends buying ruggedized laptops as servers, thin-client pads, and wireless equipment. "Every time you set up and take down, you increase the chances of damaging your equipment. Wireless LAN greatly decreases your risk."
American Light
Austin, Texas
Challenge: Support 210 employees in eight remote locations with only two IS support staff. Need to replace aging Wyse terminals and give end users access to office productivity applications.
Evaluation: American Light, an electrical contracting and wholesale lighting company, had 50 PCs in production and a lot of administration costs. To reduce those costs, the company considered using IBM servers and NCs. However, American Light was impressed with Dell's lower cost and customer support (representatives from Dell called on American Light as the company made its purchasing decision). American Light also considered using IBM's NCs, but Neoware's NCs beat IBM on price.
American Light considered centralizing its WinFrame servers but found the resulting performance unacceptable. "There is no way that multiusers could run Windows applications remotely at 56Kbps. The most we were getting was five users on a machine. We average 19 users locally. We also had business application traffic on the same line," said Tom Riland, American Light's director of IS. American Light decided to locate a WinFrame server at each of the company's eight remote locations.
Solution: American Light purchased 150 Neoware NeoStation 520/540 NCs with 20MB of RAM and no hard disk. Each remote location has a Dell PowerEdge 4200 server with 256MB of RAM, an 18GB hard disk, and one CPU. Each server runs Citrix WinFrame 1.7 and handles around 19 Neoware devices. To further reduce TCO, American Light will use ICA with its remaining PCs.
American Light backs up user data centrally with SynchSort BackUp Express. This software performs compression and encryption and makes a differential backup once a week. According to Riland, "The servers have been rock solid. We can remotely administer the servers via ICA."
Results: "Our basic philosophy is simplicity. We spend most of our time doing application development. We [initially] got scared with PC prices, but after we were fully deployed, we realized there are a lot of savings in administration," Riland said. When users log on, they have a choice of business and productivity applications. The business applications connect to an IBM RS/6000 (UNIX) server in Austin and include order entry, payroll, human resources, and accounting applications. American Light also runs a wholesale distribution package and a construction industry application.
"We're going to use Neoware with a built-in browser to use the intranet. You can download the new Netscape browser to the server and the Neoware units will update the flash ROM automatically. When you turn them on, they update to the latest version of browser or OS automatically," Riland said. "The phones are quiet. If something breaks, it's usually the 56Kbps links."
Recommendation: Tom Riland recommends a thin client/server environment to any company supporting remote sites. "I hate to admit it, but I haven't even been to some of our sites. This technology allows easy remote administration," he said.
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