The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) invested close to R1-million recently on its Novell software upgrades. The investment, which was part of its Corporate License Agreement, included upgrades to the latest versions of Netware and GroupWise. The deal was done through Lesedi, an authorised Novell Reseller, and Novell distributor Lan Design.
According to DTI network consultant Leandra Streicher, Netware 5 is the leading network for Internet-enabled businesses. "NetWare 5 combines the maturity and reliability of the traditional NetWare network with the global reach and open standards of the Internet. It lets us create a network based on Internet protocols, while using your existing network investments."
Streicher believes the growth of the Internet and Internet-based networks has prompted companies to look at new strategies for getting and sharing information, both within their own organisation and with partners, suppliers and customers. As a result, DTI is building and maintaining heterogeneous computing environments that combine local and wide area networks, the Internet, and intranet operations.
"By moving to the open protocols of the Internet with NetWare 5, Novell has adapted the world`s most popular server operating system to meet the changing needs of today`s enterprises, both large and small," she adds.
DTI relies on Netware to provide the lifeline between its offices. Streicher points to speed, cost, ease-of-use, flexibility and most important, integration as key reasons for the success of the Novell solution. "Our association with Netware started in 1988 and we still rely heavily on the Netware operating system, Netware IP transmission protocol and Groupwise electronic messaging today."
"NetWare is an integral part of our department and our network is our most critical business tool, the DTI cannot function without it. Being able to implement new applications through NDS is a pretty neat feature. It would not have been possible to manage our entire network including hardware, operating systems and the wide variety of software and applications, with only a handful of network administrators, had it not been for centralised administration of NDS," she adds.
Streicher says with only four permanent network administrators, three temporary staff and two data technologists, the DTI successfully manages its network with just over a 1 000 demanding users in three locations. "Their daily tasks vary from fault finding, configuring hardware, network management, server management, user administration to the implementation of new solutions."
"Over the years we have maintained a 99 percent availability of systems based on 7x24x365 usage. We consider ourselves to be a Novell House, choosing this solution for its stability and especially the performance of NetWare and finally, the extended feature sets of Enterprise Server and GroupWise."
Novell major accounts manager Andrew Lamola says GroupWise is the first collaboration product to integrate with Novell Directory Services (NDS) combining E-mail with document management, calendaring, scheduling, task management and many other collaboration tools. "GroupWise expands E-mail from one easy-to-use place, the GroupWise Universal Mailbox, empowering users to gather, access and communicate information."
GroupWise is a Year 2000-ready, cross-platform solution with client and server software available for NetWare, NT/Windows, UNIX and Macintosh environments. All GroupWise licenses include the GroupWise desktop and remote clients, GroupWise WebAccess, GroupWise WebPublisher, Document Management and numerous administration tools, connectivity gateways and messaging server agents.
Groupwise WebAccess is a great solution for DTI`s mobile users. Through Groupwise WebPublisher the DTI has a server-based solution for document publishing and accessing of stored documents from any WebBrowser dynamically converting them from numerous formats into HTML. A great built in document management solution for any Internet/ Intranet site.
"We believe GroupWise is the easiest-to-use, lowest cost-of-ownership, open-standards-based, collaboration product. With benefits and features like these, it is easy to see why GroupWise has more than 15 million users worldwide," adds Streicher.
The DTI also uses Managewise for network management and plans to implement ZENworks and NDS for NT in the near future.
The deal forms part of DTI`s Corporate License Agreement (CLA) with Novell. CLA has been designed with the larger, distributed organisation in mind. Through a two year membership, CLA gives customers the ability to acquire all their software resources through a straightforward, no-strings "frequent flyer" agreement with Novell.
A CLA software certificate gives customers the legal right to install and use Novell software without the need to order or store multiple copies of media or documentation. It allows any department within an organisation to order Novell products and benefit from the CLA Membership Level discount. Anticipated purchases of all parts of the organisation count towards the initial discount level.
"CLA is the most economic way for the larger enterprise to purchase Novell software products," says Streicher. "The initial forecast sets the discount level, but all purchases can count towards a higher membership level. The agreement also gives us access to key Novell service options. Technical, education and training, and consulting services are all available under the programme."
Lamola adds: "Through payment of a cost effective, one-off upgrade protection fee, future versions of the protected product can be secured for the term of the programme. Furthermore, through comprehensive training and accreditation, Novell Resellers are uniquely positioned to add significant value in the provision of pre-sales advice, programme information, as well as product delivery and installation.
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