WAN Optimization

WAN Optimization

The Wide Area Network application optimization solution blends CISCO products and other technologies to deliver solutions to the company’s network and application optimization challenges. With optimization, the company will substantially enhance application performance to ensure cost-effective, secure, as well as acceptable application performance to meet the operation’s needs. Enterprise servers and software applications are continuously being centralized. Most businesses face a new challenge in providing LAN-like turnaround times through the corporate WAN despite processes, and data increasingly becomes centralized. As time goes by, the workforce is gradually being located outside the headquarters and site offices. Remote users will still require the same connectivity just as the office server over LAN.

Remote access should not hinder productivity because of slow-paced responses. Most organizations face a constant problem of achieving the turnaround time and ever-on services for remote users. There is a need to have a survival strategy so that users working remotely can continue working smoothly in the event of resource failure. Real-time applications such as VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) and streaming video have strict requirements on jitter, transport delay, packet loss as well as bandwidth availability. Hence, it is necessary to prioritize different types of traffic to minimize the risk of congestion in the end-to-end service path (Huang & Huang, 2019). This is important in a bid to deliver quality video and voice and offer preferential treatment critical business applications.

The world of computing is changing “webified” applications are at the early stage of implantation. These new applications environment will require a new kind of network that can be able to support their unique requirement regarding web-based technologies. A large organization like this company will struggle to ensure that employees can access the latest content, whether email, training collateral, video, or compliance (Fu, Wilkinson & Dawson, 2016). The organization will continuously be challenged to deliver more services such as VoIP, large files, and video streaming. Such applications will require high bandwidth.

Lieu Site challenges and implementation

Details and Challenges

An organization’s ability to failover in a seamless manner from one data center to another and the capacity to perform a backup in all the remote locations is necessary. This will always require moving massive data across the network in real-time. Additionally, the organization is likely to face the challenge of the cost when it comes to backing up data and in the event of a disaster. Managing the configuration is another problem that Lieu faces. The problem occurs since networks will always increase in size, and overseeing the configuration proves difficult. Besides, the devices on the network seem to conflict with each other, an issue that has made it challenging and almost impossible to keep the firewalls updated. Yet, applying the policies manually has continued to lead to inconsistencies and insurmountable errors.

Solutions and Technologies

The organization should consider having dynamic load balancing on several lines. Dynamic load balancing will allow the load to be distributed on the network, depending on the type of data being transmitted. The organization should also consider using data compression technology in compressing data. The organization should also consider using the de-duplication technique to eliminate duplicate data. The network should be configured in a way that local copies of data can be cached such that whenever there are changes in the originally submitted data, the system will only send the differences. FWSM (Firewall Service Module) is a fast, integrated firewall module meant for Cisco Catalyst 6500 switches. The module can be used in pairs to offer stateful inter chassis failover support to aid in ensuring resilient network protection for the data centers (Fu, Wilkinson & Dawson, 2016). The module will also make it possible for Lieu to keep the firewalls up-to-date.

Hilo Site challenges and implementations

Details and Challenges

The cost incurred in maintaining servers remotely is expensive and existing guidelines and compliances like Sarbanes Oxley and HIPPA make the cost even higher and drive server consolidation in the data center. Hilo has come to realize that a company’s available budget may seldom meet its services, especially since the network is now supporting both the new conventional services such as videoconferencing and telephony (VoIP) and the traditional IT applications. This means that it has to improve the network quality and continue to keep up with the new technologies that it has to introduce to keep its operations running. Also, the organization is likely to face the challenge of providing LAN-like response turnaround time across the network, even if processing and data continue to be centralized. This is because it fails to do this; it will continue to experience one of the top challenges that network engineers face, poor network performance.

Solutions and Technologies

Issues relating to cost can be solved by selecting the best tools that can cost-effectively serve the required purposes in the infrastructure. Yet, Hilo must embrace the new technology trends to avoid the high costs of using both modern and traditional technologies while ensuring that the network is highly optimized to promote a smooth information flow (McCauley, 2020). The company can also take advantage of outsourced scalable network management solutions to help save on overhead costs that would be incurred if the company decided to buy its management tools and hire an in-house team. Redundancy can be configured using a backup permanent virtual circuit or integrated service digital network (ISDN) failover. ISDN can provide similar switched services in terms of frame relay bandwidth. The organization may opt to use an alternative carrier service with equivalent bandwidth can be an appropriate alternative to network outages (Huang & Huang, 2019). The network traffic can be rerouted to existing backup PVC in case of failure or congestion.

Honolulu site challenges and implementation

Details and Challenges

Providing stable network connectivity between this site and the headquarters among other branches is essential. It is crucial to avoid a single point of failure. The site should also have resources for scaling and growth. Load sharing will provide both improved availability and scalability to the WAN. Load sharing can be implemented by configuring several WAN exit routers in a way that they can share the load. This method is essential as it will enhance both scaling and availability.  Remote access should not hinder productivity because of slow-paced responses. The organization is likely to face a constant problem of achieving the turnaround time and ever-on services for remote users. Honolulu also lacks efficient data storage since cloud storage does not offer architecture to accommodate various applications. Yet, the company needs a more flexible data storage architecture that goes beyond cost and space in cloud storage.

Solutions and Technologies

There is a need to have a survival strategy so that users working remotely can continue working smoothly in the event of resource failure. Providing remote access as part of the company’s network is becoming popular. The company may opt to use a dial-up connection to its network using Point-to-Point Protocol (PPP) encapsulation. PPP is one of the most popular and cost-effective technologies for offering users remote access to corporate systems (Lancaster, 2020). Security can be implemented over the link by the use of an authentication protocol such as CHAP, PAP, or MS-CHAP from Microsoft. This is essential as it will enable users to work remotely regardless of their locations. Finally, cloud storage options should be more flexible so that the company can optimize the architecture based on the application that it is deploying (Huang & Huang, 2019). The cloud storage should serve, not as a short-term, but as a long-term archival solution for Honolulu.

Sample Configuration

Copy of Packet Tracer from Assignment II

Supporting Tables/Diagrams

Table 1: Current Router Networking and Information

Table 2: Hilo Site

Table 3: Lihue Site

Table 4: Honolulu Site

Fig 1: Network Infrastructure Diagram

Bibliography

Fu, G., Wilkinson, S., & Dawson, R. (2016). A Spatial Network Model for Civil Infrastructure System Development. Computer-Aided Civil and Infrastructure Engineering, 31(9), 661-680. doi: 10.1111/mice.12204

Huang, F., & Huang, W. (2019). Network Security System and Implementation Scheme of Information Infrastructure in Geological Prospecting Industry. IOP Conference Series: Earth and Environmental Science, 300, 022125. doi: 10.1088/1755-1315/300/2/022125

Lancaster, T. (2020). Network design: Five ways to lower your costs. Retrieved 8 July 2020, from https://searchnetworking.techtarget.com/tip/Network-design-Five-ways-to-lower-your-costs

McCauley, G. (2020). How to Deal with Network Challenges to Reduce Overhead Cost?. Retrieved 8 July 2020, from https://www.extnoc.com/blog/how-to-deal-network-challenges-to-reduce-cost/