Recommend a multi site setup

Firewalkwithme

The company I work for will soon be opening an new office in another part of the country so I need to look into systems for remote working whereby the people in the new location can login to the main office network and open file and use the network resourses as though they were in the main office.

I've read about VPN's, WAN's, leased lines etc. but I'm left unsure as to what is the best option for us. My feeling is that since our work involves large amounts of data, trying to open files across a broadband connection (even a fast one) would be too slow for our needs.

What I was thinking of would be to set up a server in the new office with a mirror image of the contents of the main server on it. I would then need software to keep both servers synchronised with each other, i.e. - when a worker tries to open a file from either server, server 1 checks with server 2 to make sure it has the latest version of the file and if not, the file is copied from server 2 to server 1 before being opened. Since the servers would be constantly trying to keep in sync anyway, provided that our broadband connection is fast enough to keep up, then hopefully the above scenario would be rare.

I'd like to hear from anyone with experience of such a setup or anyone who could recommend another system that may meet my requirements. If the server sync system is feasible, what hardware / software would I need to make it happen? Can you recommend a company that deals with systems such as this?

Thanks in advance for any help offered.

Triangle

Is it just file sharing you're interested in or do you have a back office software solution that would need shared?

Personally i wouldn't recommend that approach i.e. what would happen if the link went down? (I'm not fully aware of exactly what you would be using the connection for and can't give you exact recommendations)

Have you looked into a Citrix solution? It's quite a nice solution now with many added features.

Might be best getting a consultant in to give you options and find out the exact specification of what you are trying to achieve.


Trig

Firewalkwithme

Triangle wrote:

Is it just file sharing you're interested in or do you have a back office software solution that would need shared?

There would be a little more than just file sharing. Print billing software and time logging software would also be required (or desired)

Personally i wouldn't recommend that approach i.e. what would happen if the link went down?

Having the link drop would be a risk in any remote system, it might be too costly to provide a backup link considering the size of the office!

Have you looked into a Citrix solution? It's quite a nice solution now with many added features.

I'm just looking at their site now - what products should I be looking at though?

Might be best getting a consultant in to give you options and find out the exact specification of what you are trying to achieve.

I'll be doing that alright but I still want to pick the boardsie's brains

Rattlehead_ie

As Triangle said, with out specific detailed requirements it would be hard to know what you need.

When looking at your VPN, you gota look at is it going to be constantly needed or just on demand (by sounds of it constantly needed) in that case your looking at your site to site VPN or something more dedicated.

you have the choice of a leased line (which really is just a dedicated connection - nothing to special) ,Hardware Site 2 Site VPN over a normal broadband connection, something like a sonicwall setup or something a bit more permanent like a L2VPN (MPLS Tunnel) your ISP will usually help with this, though as you said we will try to keep this within budget .

What kind of connection speeds and technology does the main office site use?
Recommendation for now would be a normal dsl \ wireless broadband setup in the remote office, that will sort your connectivity issue, now he have to look at the "sharing \ workspace issue"

What I was thinking of would be to set up a server in the new office with a mirror image of the contents of the main server on it. I would then need software to keep both servers synchronised with each other, i.e

This is certainly possible and have it run on an hourly or bi hourly basis, but once again this depends on the type of files that are going to be shared, If there huge Mb - Gb files then this is really going to hammer your connection out of it and it may also cause corruption of data, from my experience this can work but only when well implemented.

How often are the files worked on? would it be possible to do a nightly backup \ sync? Would you consider co-location (hosting the files on a dedicated machine outside of the office?

ntlbell

A budget would be nice

this is what I've used recently and it works nicley

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/technologies/storage/dfs/default.mspx

DFS in R2 rocks lil cotton socks

Firewalkwithme

Rattlehead_ie wrote:

What kind of connection speeds and technology does the main office site use?

At the moment we have a 3Mbps download 512kbps upload connection at the main office which will likely need to be upgraded. We're looking at buying new servers at the moment so this would all be part of a package. I'm really just trying to get an idea of what we might need.

This is certainly possible and have it run on an hourly or bi hourly basis, but once again this depends on the type of files that are going to be shared, If there huge Mb - Gb files then this is really going to hammer your connection out of it and it may also cause corruption of data, from my experience this can work but only when well implemented.

How often are the files worked on? would it be possible to do a nightly backup \ sync? Would you consider co-location (hosting the files on a dedicated machine outside of the office?

Just from running a quick search on the server for files edited in the past 24 hours I came up with a total of about 400MB from about 350 files. Obviously the amount of files actually needed will be greater than that when you factor in logging onto / off the network and printing etc. but it gives you some idea of the amount of data we would be transferring.

The files would be worked on constantly throughout the day, we work with Autocad drawings so it would be vital that the latest version is always available in both locations. I think a sync frequency of anything greater than one hour would be unworkable. As there will likely be people from both offices working on the same projects, we can't risk having two people working on the same drawing at one time so the files would need to be locked when in use in one location.

I hadn't though about outside hosting to be honest, do you know anyone who provides an appropriate service?

Firewalkwithme

ntlbell wrote:

A budget would be nice

Don't I know it!

this is what I've used recently and it works nicley

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/technologies/storage/dfs/default.mspx

DFS in R2 rocks lil cotton socks

That looks like it could do what I need - thanks for the link

AndrewMc

Cartoon_Head wrote:

What I was thinking of would be to set up a server in the new office with a mirror image of the contents of the main server on it. I would then need software to keep both servers synchronised with each other, i.e. - when a worker tries to open a file from either server, server 1 checks with server 2 to make sure it has the latest version of the file and if not, the file is copied from server 2 to server 1 before being opened. Since the servers would be constantly trying to keep in sync anyway, provided that our broadband connection is fast enough to keep up, then hopefully the above scenario would be rare.

I haven't used it myself, but I think something like OpenAFS does something like this. Go to the Administrator's Guide in the Documentation section, and have a look at "An Overview of AFS Administration".

joePC

If you can answer the following question then I can give you some excellent solutions.

1. Site locations
2. Current Broardband connections in each location (if any)
3. Main applications being used i.e. Autocad / Outlook / Payroll software etc...
4. Hardware / servers in the main office & OS's e.g. Windows / Unix / Linux?
5. Budget (If available)

If you can answer the following I'll PM you some options.

Thanks, Joe