Network Convergence and unified communication
It is evident that traditional businesses have decided to adopt IT in realization of the realities of the new machine age. This is mainly done to improve the profitability of a business in terms of ease of relaying business information between producers and consumers. EZY – books being a specialized publisher for customized book publication service needs to implement the use of IT infrastructure to ease their day to day operation to both the employees and customers alike. The use of the various components of IT has led to the grow and evolution of businesses, implying that IT has become a necessity. The current economic environment is dominated by globalization, hyper-competition and the knowledge revolution. This new innovative age is obvious through increased interest in PC handling and information planning apparatuses in the assembling what’s more, benefit enterprises and broadcast communications foundation, and furthermore to it’s across the board utilization in government offices, instructive associations, and, all the more as of late, in the family. Because of this innovative advancement, the usage and utilization of IT is a huge main impetus behind numerous financial changes. As the usage and commercialization of IT moves toward becoming broader all through the world, the appropriation of novel IT can create new business openings and different advantages (Herring & Androutsopoulos, 2015). The IT tools supply the required infrastructure, which is necessary for providing appropriate types of data at the right time.
It is important to ascertain the problems that has led to the need of the new networking structure in EZY – Books. The problems in this case include the fact that the operation of business in quite old in relation to adoption of modern networking infrastructure in that customer services rely on paper-based forms. This is accompanied by many problems that the company has noted and thus the need for the new IT infrastructure set up.
The network planning solutions will involve the different makeup of the entire networking of the business and its subsequent branches in Melbourne and Brisbane. This is to imply that the report covers the constituent parts of the new proposed infrastructure:
This involves having the best mix of technology in regards to addressing specific business needs. The EZY- Books organization can adopt this infrastructure which mainly entails the use of: IP telephony, unified messaging, voice mail, Web conferencing and Videoconferencing. In this case this can act as a solution to reduce intra office and long distance communication cost. These technologies can also act on increasing productivity by use of means of communication such as e-conferencing, by reducing downtime which is implicit in business transactions. The new infrastructure will enable the linking of all customers’ phones to multiple offices by treating the telephones as an intercom and thus a need for only a single internet connection. Basically, this will form an integrated network since there will be a single access point. This will result to easy management as there will be no multiple tools or network infrastructure to manage. This will mainly benefit operation of business since employees can be able to collaborate more effectively. The key reason for adopting this infrastructure setup is because it makes it easier and faster for customers and employees to exchange information and ideas, query, and accessing of data.
LAN Types and Cabling Plan
This is the network mainly made for an office, building or room. This is the interconnection of devices within a small geographical area allowing for sharing of resources like printers and information within a business building. The local area network comprises of different technologies like: bus technology, ring technology and star technology. In the bus technology interconnectivity of computers is done through a single wire. Computers continue to share files and data even if one of the connected computers stops working. This is the oldest technology in the networking business.
The ring technology involves interconnection of computers in a ring or circle form. In this topology a computer is connected to each computer on either sides. If the computer decides to send a file to a computer that is further in distance, then the file is transferred through residing computers.
Unlike the ring topology the star topology, though similar, makes use of a switch in the center that is connected to every computer in the ring (Liang & Turban, 2011). Through a hub the other computers are connected to the switch. Data transfer between connected computers happen through the switch in that all conveyed data travels from hub to switch then to designate machine. Wi-Fi can also be considered as a local area network when its put in consideration of wireless LAN.
The above topologies can be applicable in the office environs to help in daily operation of the business in relation to transfer of information between offices. This set up can also help in the storage of documents in a file server to allow for easy retrieval by the sales representatives. This can be applicable in both the head branch in Sydney and the branches.
The most prolific cabling plan for the head office of EZY – Books is adoption of a local area networking topology in this case the star topology is more applicable since it is effective in transfer and interconnection of computers and other devices. The most effective cabling for this setup is use of Ethernet cables for connection between the devices, cat 6 and above being most recommended for the setup. The connection from switch to computers and routers will involve a straight-through cabling while that of switch to switch will involve a crossover connection. Wi-Fi connection can also be applicable through connection from switch to the Wi-Fi modem.
The connection between the head office and branches at Melbourne and Brisbane will involve the use of wide area network that will require a connection through fiber optic cables since they allow for transmission of data and information over long distances and at a higher bandwidth. Wide area network is as a result of connecting more than one local area network. In this case the connection will be from server to router which will then be distributed to the branch through connection of switches. This connection will help in the collaboration of head office and branches. It will also help in the operation of both the head office and branches.
WAN Connection
Above is the cabling plan of the offices. Computers are connected through star topology as shown above .Each office will a printer that is connected to the network in the office. The network from the server are linked to the server through firewall that filters data. The server is located in the cloud and accessed by all offices regularly at equal rates.
A WAN consists of more than one local-area networks. This entails connection of computers through public networks or through satellites. Internet is considered to be the largest existence of WAN. Effectiveness of communication is vital and this connection seeks to provide viable channels for communications. The branch office which can be found in remote areas are mostly connected to head office by WAN. Resources in branch office are limited to the number of employees in the branch and thus they have less important servers (Kim & Feamster, 2013). The most important servers are kept in the man office and as such the WAN connection happens between the servers either through wireless transmission like satellites or through wire connections like the fiber optic cables which is the most considered media of transmission. The WAN connection in this case can be of three topologies full mesh site to site WAN, hub and spoke site to site WAN and partial mesh site to site WAN. Connections like this are done through routers where branch office connects to the router of head office. Traffic is routed through head office router when branches need to communicate to each other. The WAN connection comprises of LAN network in each office connected together has shown below to form a wider network
Networked services runs at the application layer and above providing data storage, communication, presentation and manipulation implemented using a client server or peer to peer architecture basing on application layer. The four networked services that can be deployed in this case are: intranet, extranet, VOIP and email.
This is a web-based application that runs on the local area network displaying company information. It is considered to be a versatile cost-effective way to support business needs. Intranet can help EZY- Books in strategic business support, knowledge management, surveys on customers, monitoring processes and collection of data, video and teleconferencing and forms the server, all this is achieved in conjunction with other software like databases. Attributing to the range application of intranet it goes to prove of how important it is to the growth of a business.
Networked Services
EZY- Books’ intranet can be extended to the supply chain through extranet application. It is mainly an extension of company network. Is a collective Internet association with clients and exchanging accomplices intended to give access to particular organization data, and encourage nearer working connections (Comer, 2018). The applicable devices in an extranet are a router. Firewall, server and a dedicated WAN. Extranet can be applied in helping customers in their order inquiry, online discussions and mostly customer services. This will help resolve customer complaints.
It is a technology that mainly works by converting voice into digital signals thus enabling one to make a call from a computer, a voice over IP phone or any other data driven device. This can be applicable in both the intranet and extranet as a mode of communication since it enables flexibility. It can proves advantageous to EZY- Books by being cost effective, accessible and has a good voice quality.
It can be utilized for intra-organization correspondences, showcasing purposes and planning with colleagues, providers and clients. Some normal favorable circumstances of business email over conventional mail or phone interchanges are cost reduction, bring down overhead and speed. Email software is accessible for each size business, taking into consideration altered business and representative connections. Email works by a sender sending a message using email client, where the text is uploaded to Simple Mail Transfer Protocol serves as outgoing. The outgoing mail is queued and waits as SMTP communicates to DNS in order to connect to recipient email server. On logging in to email account the email client downloads all the new messages from the recipient’s email server.
The most applicable storage for the EZY- Books would be cloud storage since it’s the perfect file sharing tool, in cases where emails can’t send large multimedia files and documents. This storage offers a reliable data backup solution, effective access to files and a simpler way of sharing files. Cloud storage also allows access to any type of computer thus allows for usability. In business recovery of data due to an accident is something that is of utmost importance, which through use of cloud storage can be easy to recover. Cloud storage allows for accessibility of stored files from anywhere provided there is an internet connection. Distributed databases can also be used in the branches since the resources in branches are limited in terms of servers (Pathan, 2016).
The applicable data processing model in this case would be the client to server model which works by partitioning workloads between source providers (servers) and the clients (service requesters). This can be used to source data from the main servers of EZY- Books by the branches and employees of the company. It is mostly used to source information from the cloud.
Another applicable processing model is the peer to peer which involves more than one pc are connected to each other and share resources without necessarily going through a separate server computer. This can be most effective in an office setup where employees need to share information with each other or to the head of the company. Mainly used in LAN networking.
Conclusion
It is evident from the report that application of modern IT will help in facilitating EZY- Books business to take care of the complaints that were raised as a result of using an old form of relying service by the business. This can be accomplished by the paper-based forms being replaced by email applications or a website application. Video conferencing can help in communicating with customers to ease the trouble of face to face communication. In this way the email forms filled can be hosted in the company’s server thus avoiding loss over the same. Processing orders will be improved by applying the use of the IT infrastructure (McConnell, 2014). The documents stored locally by the sales representatives of the company can be shared to each one of them through peer to peer connection or host their documents on a common server like the cloud server for easier and fast retrieval of information. Observing of best applicable IT practices and infrastructure goes a long way in ensuring profitability of a business.
References
Comer, D.E., 2018. The Internet book: everything you need to know about computer networking and how the Internet works. Chapman and Hall/CRC.
Herring, S.C. and Androutsopoulos, J., 2015. Computer-mediated discourse 2.0. The handbook of discourse analysis, 2, pp.127-151
Liang, T.P. and Turban, E., 2011. Introduction to the special issue social commerce: a research framework for social commerce. International Journal of electronic commerce, 16(2), pp.5-14.
Kim, H. and Feamster, N., 2013. Improving network management with software defined networking. IEEE Communications Magazine, 51(2), pp.114-119.
McConnell, D., 2014. Implementing computing supported cooperative learning. Routledge.
Pathan, A.S.K. ed., 2016. Security of self-organizing networks: MANET, WSN, WMN, VANET. CRC press.
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