industry spotlight

Public Infrastructure companies providing construction, transport, engineering and utility systems are among the most disparate, multi-site private-sector organisations. For these businesses, it is imperative to maintain end-user focus and spend efficiency, while reducing the risk of network failure and time-to-fix.

Balfour Beatty serves the international markets for rail, road and utility systems, buildings and complex structures. It selected NetEvidence's Highlight service as the core reporting solution for the company's 'OneNet' project, which incorporates multi-network technologies including MPLS (IP Clear), xDSL & leased lines (IP Stream), across multiple service providers.

Nigel Homewood, IT manager for Balfour Beatty Rail, explains: "We use Highlight in three differing ways - as a master view for executive planning and budgeting, for network management of key business applications, and operationally to determine problem cause and where to apply resources. None of the alternatives were as clear or as informative."

Highlight's flexibility is key to mapping Balfour Beatty's complex business structure, enabling users across all 19 businesses to use the solution. It has received over 1,500 accesses in 2007 so far.

notworking

Tired after a long day monitoring and managing that relentless network empire? Put the world to rights, literally, tinkering with your very own virtual solar system!

Galaxiki is a virtual, free content, web 2.0 galaxy created, maintained and owned by its community. Become a 'Galaxician' and start editing public stars, planets and moons, or pay a few pounds and take on a personal star system. Galaxiki spans over a million stars in solar systems that can be explored via a two-dimensional map. Each star, planet and moon represents one wiki page, the idea being to spin fictional histories around your worlds, published under the GNU Free Documentation Licence.

welcome

...to the second issue of The Monthly Highlight, a regular newsletter created for NetEvidence's customers, partners, and users of our core product, Highlight.

This month as well as catching up on some of the more interesting network news headlines, we shine the industry spotlight on Public Infrastructure, focus on a powerful toolbar feature within Highlight we think you'll find invaluable in the future, and update you on the strengths of adding your personal favourites to the Network Explorer. There's even time for a bit of fun and intergalactic empire building in our Notworking section.

Once again I hope you find The Monthly Highlight enjoyable and informative, and invite you to drop me a line with any feedback or interesting ideas you might have for future issues.

Best regards,

- Jeremy

Jeremy Edwards, NetEvidence services director
jedwards@net-evidence.com

network news

Wi-Fi steps up the pace

Scientists at the Georgia Electronic Design Center (GEDC) have developed a 60GHz band Wi-Fi system capable of transferring huge amounts of data over very short distances. Wireless data-transfer rates of 15Gbit/s over a span of one metre have been achieved, according to Techworld. Bluetooth and Wi-Fi are usually considered unsuited for rapidly transferring large files, such as high-definition video, however the new system could theoretically download a two-hour DVD-quality film in less than five seconds. Ofcom will publish its own policy on the 60GHz+ band later this year.

VoIP still a big noise

Businesses have increased their IP telephony spend in 2007, and will continue to do so for the next couple of years, according to a new report from analyst firm Forrester Research. A survey of  516 'landline voice decision-makers' across North American and Europe revealed that more than half (54%) are increasing their budgets for IP PBX systems and services this year, with planned migrations continuing over the next few years. The report confirms: "The market for IP telephony will continue to evolve beyond basic telephony upgrades as enterprises demand increased flexibility and mobile solutions for their workers."

Web 2.0 ban a bad plan

Will advice from the TUC steer the attitudes of US companies trying to figure out how to cope with employees using social networking sites such as Facebook, Myspace and Bebo in the workspace? Our very own Trades Union Congress (TUC) is advising British businesses that outright bans might not be as effective as formal policies for acceptable use. A recent poll of 600 employees conducted by security vendor Sophos and reported in Network World claimed that of the 50% of respondents who said their companies had not blocked access to Facebook, 8% thought their companies feared a backlash from employees.

feature focus

We understand that as the network on which your business relies upon increases in size, you need single visibility right across your organisation to fulfil executive, management and operational perspectives. That is why Highlight delivers an essential Exec Toolbar capable of focusing on the business issues at hand, rather than the technology alone.

Executives are generally satisfied if they are entirely confident that their network spend is efficient, the network is proven to be right-sized and if they know that network delivery is consistently to the right standard. Network managers on the other hand need to instantly see what is overloaded, what is breaking and ensure delivery on provider SLAs is bullet-proof. Finally, operators want the freedom to be able to drill-down to summarise and locate their own issues.

'Congestion Finder' ranks links by heaviest utilisation to identify bandwidth upgrade requirements

'Capacity Tuner' ranks links by lowest utilisation for tuning, capacity for new services or savings

'Outage Manager' ranks links by outage duration to target availability issues and SLA adherence

'Health Check' ranks links by discards and line errors to identify actions to improve network quality

highlight update

Navigating with the Network Explorer is as simple as storing your documents on a desktop computer. Networks can be grouped into folders for each customer, or even sub-divided by business division or geography. These can be expanded in order to select individual folders and locations before refining the view in the main Highlight display.

Once you have identified particular folders or individual network links that that you would like to keep an eye on, it's easy to add them to your 'Favourites'. You do this by viewing any network link and clicking the 'Add to Favourites' button on the 'Detail' toolbar.
Clicking the 'Favourites' folder at the top of your explorer will then display your personal view displaying only what matters to you the most. 

how do I get highlight?

NetEvidence provides Highlight in a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) model through partnerships with service and solutions providers (http://www.net-evidence.com/web/site/Partners/partnersTab.asp), who provide performance visibility to their customers.

If you're interested in more information about Highlight, or need your login details resetting, please email support@net-evidence.com and we will liaise to action your request.

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If you would like to unsubscribe from this newsletter or are experiencing any problems receiving or viewing it, please contact netevidence-newsletter@prompt-communications.com

disclaimer

You are receiving this newsletter as a reseller or user of NetEvidence's Highlight solution. If you want to stop receiving this newsletter, please contact netevidence-newsletter@prompt-communications.com. NetEvidence is aware of its responsibilities regarding the Data Protection Act and will not share any of your personal information with third parties without your explicit authorisation.