1. What are the business goals?

2. What are the business constraints?

3. What are the technical goals?

4. What are the technical constraints?

5. Diagram the existing network.

6. Describe the existing network traffic.

7. Complete this table for all of the applications that currently run over the network.

The organization in question is a community college with a single multibuilding campus. As the local area grows in population, this campus is experiencing a corresponding growth in enrollment. In order to meet this growth in on-campus students as well as accommodate the demand for online courses, the school is redesigning the network.

As the main source of funding for the school is revenue from a property tax and previously approved bond issue, the funds must be spent in a fiscally prudent manner while still delivering the required network improvements. The administration, in consultation with the elected board of directors, the student body, the population of the taxing district, and the faculty, has determined the following improvements are needed.

Build a new IT wing onto the administration building to centralize all of the servers that are currently located in a closet in each of the individual buildings.

Connect all of the buildings to the new IT wing of the administration building.

Provide controlled wireless access for the students in each classroom.

Provide open wireless access for the students and the local population in the areas outside of each building.

Provide a high-speed wired network connection to each faculty office.

Provide a centralized online backup of all data designated for backup.

Replace the PBX-based telephone system with a VOIP-based system.

Steps to Prepare for Future Growth

As the population growth expands, an additional campus will be required on the other side of the county within the next few years. In the recent bond election, the voters approved funding to purchase land next to a business park the city has established. This new location is 15 miles from the current campus. A city-owned hiking trail that runs along an abandoned railroad line connects the two locations.

Existing Network

The current network consists of a Category 5 CM-rated UTP cable that is installed in the plenum space above the false ceiling to each work area and classroom in every building on the campus. The part of the cable from the ceiling to each device drops out of the ceiling and lies on the floor. The other end of each of these horizontal cables is connected to a patch panel mounted in a relay rack in a closet in each building. Also in the relay rack is one or more Cisco FastHub 400s to provide the interaction between devices. Utilization on these devices typically runs at 73% or more on a five minute average with sustained spikes to 100%. There are typically 37 users logged into each server. Each faculty member has a laptop computer and a printer. They move these from their office to the classrooms as necessary. Each building is on its own self-contained network. The gym, physical education offices, and labs are all arranged in the same manner as the offices and classrooms. Backup is to a tape that is changed by the IT staff each day. The backup tapes are stored in the administration building. The IP addressing scheme is the same in each building. They all use the 192.168.1.0/24 addressing scheme. The addresses are issued from a DHCP service running on each building's server. None of the buildings are connected to each other. Student network access is through a 2.4GHz 802.11b open wireless network whose access points are mounted on overhead light poles outside of each building. Each access point is tied into the building's local area network. Each access point functions as a hotspot network within a walled garden. Each student is responsible for their own equipment. An account issued by the IT department is required to access the student network. There are typically 42 students logged into each access point.

The Internet access for each building is through a separate DSL connection provided by the local telephone company as each network was installed as needed over the years.

In the administration building, the network runs on an AS400 minicomputer. This device contains all student data.

In the library, the catalog and checkout systems run on a single local server. Access to this system is through a set of PCs located near the front desk.

The e-mail system is provided through Google Apps for Education. The campus website is through this system as well.

The applications running over the network in each building include Microsoft Office, a web browser, and shared data on the server for each LAN. In the administration building there is terminal-server traffic between the AS400 and the administration PCs running a terminal emulation program.

New Network

The requirements for the revised network are:

Reduce and centralize the servers in the IT wing of the Administration Building.

Reduce the number of and centralize the Internet connection for the entire campus.

Establish a server to control faculty and staff network access, as well as to issue IP addresses for all devices that can use a dynamic IP address.

Establish a server to control student network access inside the buildings, as well as to issue IP addresses to these devices.

Establish a single IP addressing scheme for the entire campus.

Prevent interaction between the faculty and staff network and the student network.