Back in 2004, senior management at the University of Calgary crafted a new network vision for the school. “The vision was that staff, students, faculty and researchers be able to work where they want, when they want and access the information they want without unnecessary constraints placed upon them,” says Dean Berschl, senior security analyst for the university. One of those unnecessary constraints was having network access restricted by wireline connections. Two years later, the university is well on its way to achieving its goal with 1,500 wireless access points deployed and plans forming for an even more ambitious deployment that would allow staff and students to carry their wireless access over to other institutions.
Berschl and the school’s IT staff began their wireless deployment in August, 2005. The first phase ended last September, the second phase just finished up and the third phase, which will tie in remote locations and add outdoor coverage, will be complete next September. The wireless network is supporting everything the university’s wireline network supported, plus voice over wireless. The school is experimenting with a wireless RFID application and Berschl expects people will come forward with more advanced applications in the future.
Berschl and his staff decided to go with Aruba Networks as the school’s wireless vendor. “At that time (2005), in our opinion it was the most advanced wireless vendor.... They had a number of features which are ideally suited to university environments.” One of the biggest benefits of going with Aruba was simpler virtual LAN (VLAN) administration, Berschl says. With most vendors’ gear, he notes, in order to set up VLANs, IT staff have to configure all devices across a network. In the university’s case that meant thousands of devices. “That was totally unacceptable to us,” he says. With Aruba’s equipment though, the VLANs are virtualized within the Aruba controllers. “That allowed us to segment our wireless network without having to configure thousands of devices,” he says. Another advantage of going with Aruba was the vendor’s integration with AirMagnet Inc.’s Enterprise Analyzer, Berschl says. Enterprise Analyzer allows network managers to provide remote real-time troubleshooting, which was a critical feature for the University of Calgary, because the school has wireless access points in a number of remote sites, some as far as 300 kilometres away.
“I can have full control and see exactly what’s going on in the network,” Berschl says. “I don’t have to leave my office.” Enterprise Analyzer also allowed Berschl to identify some potential security problems he hadn’t expected. So far the wireless project has gone smoothly, Berschl says. The only thing that caught the IT staff off guard was the high demand for the wireless network when it first rolled out.
In 2004, the university had deployed a small wireless network that attracted about 150 users a day. The IT staff expected that traffic on the new network in 2005, at least initially, would be similar, Berschl says. Instead, on the first day it was launched in September 2005, the new network hosted 600 users and by Christmas was averaging 2,000 a day. This month Berschl is expecting around 5,000 users a day.
“We underestimated how much pent-up demand there was,” he says. “That presents its own set of problems, because when you become that popular you have to make sure your deployment is rock solid. Nothing can go wrong on that wireless network.” Once the university has completed its own network rollout, Berschl hopes to reach agreements with other institutions in Alberta that would allow the school’s students to log on using their University of Calgary passwords and log-ins and roam on other wireless networks.
“Wi-Fi is not a phase we’re going through,” he says.
“As time progresses you’re going to see hundreds of large Wi-Fi deployments in Canada. The next step will be to encourage students to broaden their horizons of where they are when they study.”
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