ISS PROJECT UPDATE INFRASTRUCTURE RENEWAL PROGRAMME

In This Update

What is IRP?

IRP Elements

What stage is the

Programme at

How it will affect you

Technical and Man-

aged Services

Technical View-Point

Migration and transi-

tion Calendar

What is IRP? The Infrastructure Renewal Programme (IRP) is a series of IT Infrastruc-

ture projects required in order to provide NUI Galway with the technical

capability to provide a secure, resilient and high performing infrastructure

which meets the requirements of the University.

The key programme outcomes are:

Offer adequate and appropriate capacity which is scalable on de-mand

Provide fast access to data without interruptions Provide resilience for equipment failures from the minor to the data

centre level failures Prevent data loss Use cost-effective technologies Achieve fixed price costs Reduce internal resource commitment on infrastructure expertise Provide an infrastructure platform which is available and supported

24/7.

Information Solutions and Services—Infrastructure Renewal Programme February 2015

IRP Elements IT Infrastructure can be viewed as consisting of three basic ele-

ments

Compute Power — we are replacing and upgrading approxi-

mately 95% of the compute power across both Data Centers.

These are the main “engines” for the IT services provided.

Network Capability — we have upgraded the bandwidth and

resilience of our connectivity to the external world, at a campus

level and at an individual buildings level.

Data Storage — we have upgraded and expanded the data

storage capacity, and data back-ups, within each Data Center.

This ensures we have adequate expansion capability for 3 to 5

years.

Did you Know?

An IT Strategy for

NUI Galway has been

developed and is

available.

IRP is one of the key

IT Strategic Pro-

grammes

ISS will provide you

with any extra infor-

mation you require

around IRP, just

email

John.Lavelle@NUIGa

lway.ie

What stage is the Programme at? Network

Over the past 18 months we have been addressing the network elements of this

programme. This work has been largely completed and focus now turns to the

compute and storage requirements.

Compute & Storage

After research on market trends and anticipation of future developments in the

area a converged Compute and Storage solution, complimented by full Technical

Support and a Managed Service element for specific areas, was put out to an EU

tender.

Contract Award

Following the procurement process the contract was awarded to MJFloods Tech-

nology partnered with HP. This solution proposed by this partnership provided the

best overall fit to our exacting requirements.

Installation and Commissioning

The installation and commissioning of the kit have now been completed and we

have entered the migration phase.

Migration

Within this phase we will be migrating nearly all of our compute and storage ele-

ments from the old environment to the new. We are endeavoring to make this

transition as seamless as possible but there will be some impact on the affected

services.

Service & Customer Owner Engagement

We are currently in the process of engaging with key customer and users through

the University to identify and plan the optimal time for the physical transition to

occur. If you are directly impacted you may already have been contacted, other-

wise you will be contacted shortly.

The Timing

Our planned window for migra-

tion and transition into full pro-

duction is throughout March and

April.. The timing of this migration

and transition will be defined in

conjunction with the key users

which will allow minimal service

impact.

The new HP Converged Compute & Storage

Converged Infrastructure oper-

ates by grouping multiple information technology (IT) components into a single, optimized computing package. Compo-nents of a converged infrastructure may include servers, data storage devic-es, networking equip-ment and software for IT infrastructure management, automa-

tion and orchestration.

How it will affect

you.

As a University

The “IT Wheel” represents the

way in which IT is delivered as

a Services to the core activi-

ties of the University; Teach-

ing, Learning & Research. It is

useful to view this as a wheel

as it allows us to view the cen-

tral green circle (the Infra-

structure layer) as the hub

upon which all of these Uni-

versity services rely. In es-

sence the platform supports

all services.

As an IT Business Ser-

vice Owner

You will be consulted on the

optimal timing for the service

transition over the next two

month period.

As an IT Service User

You will be informed of any

maintenance slots required to

enable the transition within the

next two month period

The Impact

The IT wheel used to highlight

those services which shall be

transitioned before the end of

March 2015.

Where the Service is not high-

lighted in amber it should be

noted that there may be some

cross impact such as when

the databases are transition-

ing.

NUIG IT Services delivering into the University—”The IT wheel”

Technical and Managed Services As part of this programme of work we have engaged in a new Service Level Agreement (SLA) based contract with MJFloods

Technology for the provision of technical support and managed services for the new Infrastructure. This will be managed

through ISS which ensures a seamless change for those outside ISS.

John Lavelle

|Head of Strategy, Architecture & Security| ISS | National University of Ireland, Galway

|:+ 353 91 492124 |:086 0214774| John.Lavelle@NUIGalway.ie

Converged Infrastructure Support and Management Services

Technical View-Point

For those of a more technical persua-

sion the logical presentation of the

new Infrastructure is presented. For

Disaster Recovery purposes compute

and storage capability is matched in

both data centers.

Migration and Transition Calendar

The calendar below is the current proposed schedule for migration and transition into the new infrastruc-

ture environment. Whilst the current planned week has certainty about it in terms of the target services

and service elements which will be migrated the subsequent weeks may be subject to some change and

variation as timings and dependencies are identified and agreed between services owners and custom-

ers.

Please check back weekly for updates to this page.