SECR 1213 NETWORK COMMUNICATIONS

CASE STUDY

Faculty of Computing Upgrade needs

Background information

The Faculty of Computing (FC) currently has 1200 students (both undergraduate and
postgraduate), 97 academic and 35 supporting staffs. They anticipate a 10% growth in both
students and academic staffs in the next 3 years. To facilitate this growth, FC plans to build a
new 2 –storey building. This new building will house 4 new labs, 1 video conferencing
room, for virtual project meetings. It will also house a student lounge that will give students
an area to work and relax while connected to the network via WIFI. A total 30 workstations
for each lab. The labs are divided into: 2 general purpose labs, 1 Network lab and 1 IOT lab.
Each lab and the student lounge will be 14mx10m in size.

Labs must be equipped with highspeed internet connection in preparation for education in line with 4IR (4th Industrial
Revolution). The Network Lab is a teaching lab and must be equipped networking devices
for teaching. Ask your faculty representative for more information. The IOT Lab must be
equipped with devices and peripherals that can facilitate learning. *Note: The lab size must
be suitable for the workstations and other equipment needed for the lab, as well as
comfortable for working/learning.
FC Dean wants the building to be ‘ready for anything’ and have reliable, efficient and secure
network that can be easily managed. He also noted that it should be cost effective.

Goals for the new system
As FC grows and moves forward into the future, so does the need for better equipment that
will allow for this growth. All stakeholders want to prepare for future needs to the extent
possible at the best value possible. It is important that during this transition from their old
equipment to their new equipment, they do not stop providing access to their users.
FC also wants to take steps into the future with cutting-edge technology, but don’t want to be
paying for it for the next 20 years.
FC needs to have an upgrade to their system that will allow them to utilize the elements they
feel would help their business. Those elements are:
1. A system that is easy to manage and scalable
2. Improve overall performance.
3. Provide protection from network breaches such as Internet Worms, denial-of-service
attacks and e-business application attacks.
4. Capability to support high-performance to the core backbone
5. Ability to support features such as Quality of Service and security in hardware via access
control lists (ACLs).
6. Enable secure VPN connections from remote locations

Also consider such future issues as:
1. A scalable network for future growth
2. Wireless connectivity in the future.