C.a.T.S. currently has stringent support contracts with mobile operators in Mid- and Eastern- Africa lending support mainly remotely. "Although we are making use of V-SAT technology backed up by an Internet link, there was still a need for real-time anyplace monitoring," said Johan Grobler, Managing Director of C.a.T.S.
"We also wanted our monitoring system to be transparent to the client, in terms of what we do and also afford the client the opportunity to view the same consoles we are using without ever jeopardizing security or the integrity of the client," he added.
Thus the C.a.T.S. team set to work and, making use of Linux as the operating system, on an IBM hardware platform, and incorporating Open Source software, C.a.T.S has created a support site for clients and C.a.T.S support staff alike to log in and follow system performance and resource usage online, real-time 1000s of kilometers offsite.
The system allows users, which are assigned different privileges, to log into the system via a web console and follow calls logged. Johan Grobler added that it was important not to have the system run in parallel with the current "e-mail paper trail". Thus with every call logged, e-mail is sent to the relevant participants. Information, comments etcetera can be logged on the support system via a participants e-mail client, thus making the system fully integrated and removing duplication of effort.
Added functionality is online graphs depicting vital detail like average and maximum CPU usage, telephone trunk usage and so on.
"Not only can we monitor the current situation 24 hours a day with daily, weekly and monthly graphs, but we can also identify trends and certain phenomena in the behavior of our client`s clients, especially in terms of monitoring phone calls to a customer care," Grobler continued. "It is also possible to graph CPU usage onto an activity on the system and see how user traffic affects the CPU and memory of the system.
"We see this system as a major differentiating factor for us in the area of system support. Especially in the on demand era we live in, it is important to know exactly what the effect is of set amounts of traffic on a system and being able to give clients exactly what they need. A Thumb suck does not suffice anymore," Grobler concluded.
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C.a.T.S., as an IBM business partner, focuses on IBM`s WebSphere Voice Response IVR solutions, integrated with WebSphere Voice Server and WebSphere Application Server and WebSphere Portal Server. It is available on PC and RS6000 (pSeries) platforms, as well as operating systems like AIX, OS/2 and Microsoft Windows. Johan Grobler, a professional electronics engineer, founded C.a.T.S. in 1996 after spending two years at IBM in the Network Solutions team working on Voice Applications.