Brainstorming in Collecting Data in Computer Network Design

Figure 1

Should you be appointed to lead a project in building a large corporate network infrastructure that consists of many remote sites that must be integrated into a single corporate network, what should you do? Off course the first step is developing a computer network design. Designing such a large computer network design is not easy because it is covering the initial assessment of all aspects by collecting all the information required, developing a time frame, developing the budget including the experts involved, understanding the current technologies, etc.

Developing the infrastructure from the scratch can be easier than tailoring the existing infrastructure networks. What ever the starting point of your project, the computer network design should start collecting the data as much as possible by assessing and brainstorming the current situations.

The figure 1 shows an internetwork diagram – a case study in developing a computer network design in building a large inter-network infrastructure involving the main headquarter office in Sydney, representative office in Jakarta and a gold mine – a remote site in the middle of the Borneo jungle. As the project leader, you are in charge of leading the project to build an inter-network for easy communication between the sites including the data, voice and probably video streaming as well as developing communication system to the world
Let’s start assessing all the requirements for telecommunication system.

Telecommunication Requirements

Telecommunication requirements are the major tasks in developing an inter-network communications between the remote sites. The capability of inter-network communication securely is a challenge. For example you can start with the following questions in collecting the data for communication requirements.

1. Implementing the communication system between the Sydney and Jakarta would be easier since you can liaise with the nearest service provider in providing the communication links between the main offices in the city. The problem is how to make a communication link between the Jakarta and the remote site in the middle of the Borneo jungle? The only solution will be the satellite communication between the jungle site and Jakarta office. See types of WAN technologies.
2. What types of data that will be allowed to deliver in the Jakarta link and the remote site, will you deliver the data only, voice, video or anything else? This is important in deciding how big the bandwidth pipe you will require for latency-free link between the two sites. Satellite link is very expensive and is the only solution you can choose for remote communication.
3. How can you transport the communication equipments from the nearest city to the middle of the jungle, by land (if possible) or by Helicopter? Transporting electronic equipments would be more difficult via the land than via the air. On the other hand transporting heavy equipments via the air is much expensive than via the land especially when you have no choice.

Collect the data as much as possible to help you design the computer network regarding the communication links between the remote sites. Communication link between the sites should be implemented in the first place before other requirements to ease of communication during the projects.

Network Infrastructure Requirements

The next requirements you need to assess in collecting the data for your computer network design is the network infrastructure requirements both the logical and physical infrastructure. Logical infrastructure includes the domain names, the operating systems, the directory services and so on. Physical infrastructure includes the hardware such as the servers, the building, the cabling system and other networking devices.

The following lists some of the examples in assessing the infrastructure requirements by collecting the data that will help you in designing your computer network.

1. Design the IP address for the whole corporate network and then design the segmentation or the subnetting for each of the sites, Sydney, Jakarta and the remote site. Liaise with the ISP to get the public IP addresses in each of the entry point from the internet and other public hosts that will be used including the DNS, MX Records for the email server, the WEB server and so on.
2. Liaise with the management if the organization requires hosting public resources such as WEB server. Assess all the security risks regarding the public resources, are they located in the DMZ networks, how the users from the internet will access the resources – via secure SSL or standard access and so on. This relates to the network security appliances (If possible) that will be used.
3. Assess the security requirements regarding the network segmentation based on the security level for each of the groups if those requirements exist. If Windows server infrastructure is used, designing the group policies would be appropriate in providing the security groups based on the security segmentation to meet the business. This is generally an ongoing process when the network infrastructure has been established and all the security requirements can be developed as the network grows. See also the management of information security.
4. How will you provide the service level agreement (SLA) for the network resources? Are there any applications that must be operational with 99.99% uptime and any downtime cannot be tolerated except planed downtime. This will relate to availability and redundancy requirements regarding the hardware that will be used if you really need a clustering system or load balancing system.
5. Are you going to implement the wireless access to the users? You should consider all the obstacles that will contribute the signal attenuator that will just create dead spots. Generally in remote location you probably find obstacles in running the backbone cable to link between the buildings, consider in using the wireless bridge.
6. Assess the requirements of remote access by travelling executives or travelling users if they require creating secure tunneling to the corporate network. Remote access becomes so popular today to let employee keep productive even though they are away from the office.
7. Will you push the emails to be accessible via Blackberry? If so you should also develop the security risk assessment if the requirement of pushing the email via cellular network is secure enough not to compromise the corporate security system.

Dig and dig the data as much as possible regarding the infrastructure requirements in your computer network design to meet the business needs. This will help you in forecasting the allocated budget, the skill personnel as well as the requirements of educating the users.

Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity

The last but not the least, you should develop the business continuity and disaster recovery planning. In designing your computer network, the disaster management should be in minds that affect the way you develop the system. All the design must be tested with a “what if” questions to make sure that you provide appropriate control regarding the disaster if it may occur. For example when you build a server room, you should also consider the backup server room in case of disaster might destroy the main server room. You should always think and provide control every single points of failure or any critical points of the systems.

In designing the computer network, you should perform the assessment by collecting the data as much as possible to help you develop the time-frame, the budgeting requirements, the man power and the skill personal that will in charge.

By Ki Grinsing

MCSE & CCNA engineer

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