Improving Information Technology Infrastructure For AusEd Online Learning Platform

Challenges faced by AusEd

Discuss about the Information Technology Infrastructure Management for AusEd.

AusEd is an educational programme organization in Australia, the organisaion is aimed at providing educational and learning programme to students who access the organization resources online and learn. But now that the number of the students with the interest of having their future possible in the orgnaisation, it demands that the organization improve the Information Technology  infrastructure. This is done in order to make sure that the organization is able to provide for the increasing number of students who are using the same online portal to learn.  The information technology infrastructure  comprises of all the resources which wen incorporated in the system , they are able to provide smooth access to the technology resources. Since the organization provides online based type of learning, the infrastructure which was initially being used could not carter for the increased number of students who are accessing the online services. The current information technology infrastructure cannot serve the current number of clients in the organization as the system is now very slow in terms of service delivery. The overall number of support personnel cannot also meet the number of clients accessing the support department through both live chat requests and also calls, (Sotomayor et al 2009). 

The increase of the number of users or clients in any business is a indication of the positive growth of the business. For the AusEd organization, the respective increase in the number of students who want to access the online education at the comfort of their home automatically indicates the growth of the system. Due to this, the service delivery must also be improved for the satisfaction of the clients. The existing system cannot be able to carter for the large population of the students since:

1. The server which was being used initially could not serve the clients accessing the portal hence inconveniencing the client, the system becomes so slow during access time due to large traffic in the system
2. The contact with the client through the live chart is also inconvenienced since the number of the clients accessing the support exceeds the total number of transactions and clients who can access the support at the same time hence hindering some clients.

• The resources available online for educational purposes cannot meet the large population interested in the learning. 

The above problems are among the factor which necessitated the organization to lay down ways of reviewing the infrastructure in order to make it possible for the learning  process to be smooth. This will also see the AusEd organization being one of the most outstanding online based learning platform in the whole country and the world too, (Laudon and Laudon 2015). 

The information technology infrastructure is comprised of the following seven major components:

1. The computer hardware components or platform. This includes both the server machine and the machines of the client. The server machine is possessed by the AusEd organization and this is the machine that the client access remotely for resources. the server machine must be massive and with high properties to serve many requests at the same time, (Dikaiakos et al 2009). The resource are stored in a server machine , and they are restricted in such a way that the client can only access the resources but has no authority to manipulate the data that are in the server.
2. The operating system platform. This is made up of the operating system in the computer of the client provided by the windows operating systems, the servers of the organization which are provided also by the windows servers operation system and the Unix which is provided by the Linux corporation. The operating system are the software which are used to manage the hardware of the computer, (Wu et al 2012). The system provides the graphical user interface where the user interacts with the hardware of the computer and performs transactions.

• The Enterprise software applications. This is the software which the clients interacts with in order to access the resources online or remotely. This is an online based portal which gives the students who are remotely located access to the resources which are store in the server of the organization. It acts as the middleware between the organization and the students. The students browse and search for courses and learning materials in this platform, (Durmu?o?lu 2009).

1. Data management and storage: the management of data and the storage of data which includes, students information, the course outlines, the learning materials , the accreditation materials and any other relevant data which can be accessed by the students are all handled using the database management software and the devices for storage, (Durmu?o?lu 2009).. For the storage of data and learning resources, the AusEd used the physical server with huge disk storage spaces.
2. The networking and the telecommunication platforms: the organization is networked using the local area network, this is to enhance communication in the organization and easy access to the information, resources and upload of resources which are to be accessed by the students at the clients end. The domain for the portal is online based but the resources are physically hosted using the physical server.
3. Internet platforms : these comprises of the third party organization which provides the internet which makes in possible for the students and the organization personnel to chat on the live chat, the website domain access and hosting and other services which are remotely accessed.

• The personnel of the organization. Theses includes the individuals which are employed by the organization in order to help in service delivery. These includes, the department assistants, the support personnel, the consultants for the information technology and maintenance personnel and other individuals who are present in the organization and who helps to complete the information technology cycle.

The above are the components which are needed to be reviewed in order to manage the large number of students who are accessing the system portals and learning resources.

Components of the Information Technology Infrastructure

The system architecture

The system architecture of the organization is made up of three main layers of which each of the layer runs of a different platform.

The user interface is the platform where the students access the server resources, this is accessed using the student computer.

The middleware or the data processing layer which runs on the server and this is made in such a way that it can be able to serve more than one student

The database management system, this is where resources are stored. The resources are needed by the middleware so that the students can access freely, (Buyya, Yeo and Venugopal 2008).

The three tier system architecture is the best in the complete service delivery in any organization. But due to the increase in the number of the students in at AusEd, the following are the proposal on the improvement of the system.

1. The database that was initially being used by the organization is the MySQL relational database in the storage of resources. Due to increase in the number of students, the relational databases. The speed at which the relational database responds to requests when accessed at the same slows down at sometimes tend to go down and crushed hence hindering smooth learning process.

An non relational database is proposed for to handle large number of transactions at the same time without buffer and downtime. Mongo databse ot the NoSQL database is proposed for the organization. The non relational database is able to hold as many transactions as possible and the students will feel the goodness of the same. 

The server too has to be reviewed an a server which the best features to be used in place of the previous server. This goes hand in hand with the database. Proposed is the IBM thin servers with the following features; 

1. The initial user interface of the portal could only be accessed using the computer, it was not responsive and could not handle more requests at the same time.

Proposed is the light weight responsive web portal which can be accessed using various devices  and platforms; these includes the android phones, the phablets, tablets and the computers.

By so doing, the number of transactions and the students who can access the system without downtime will be so many nearing to infinite, (Durmu?o?lu  2009).. 

• The 3 tier authentication ; as the number of the clients increased, security issue will significantly increase, therefore, to prevent the portal from being hacked and resources and data manipulated by the intruders, an authentication system is proposed, the students will be signing up to the system with an email being mandatory, then the system will authenticate the validity of the email and sent the login credentials to the email address given, (Galup et al 2009). The student will be redirected to the system by the use of the encrypted link sent to the email to complete the sign up process.

The sessions of the login will be time out by the  end of every 5mins of no use to prevent a wrong user to access the portal account of the student. There will be no remember password option . 

The following are the proposed equipment, devices which can be used to improve the information technology infrastructure at AusEd. These includes the following;

1. The servers with non relational database
2. The switches

• The routers

1. The prefix pads LCD to display students and clients on call and on chat requests.
2. Firewalls to prevent authorized access to the server and the fault tolerance and side channel injections.
3. The responsive light weight portal with distinct live chat platform and download and upload capabilities. 

The infrastructure design cost analysis

	Equipment	Quantity	Amount in USD
1	Switches 5 ports	4	400
2	Routers  720Mbps	5	5000
3	Prefix pad	13	1300
4	Servers x3650	2	10000
5	Web portal update	1	120000
6	Labour	1	10000
	Misc		1200
		Total	589000

The reasons for the choice of the hardware is due to the following;

Due to the improvement and growth in the technology, the hardware which are required for the purpose of the installation of the networking platforms now comprises of the high speed devices and equipment. 

Proposal to improve Infrastructure

The servers upgrade will be high speed and this will help to reduce the down time and also the fetching of resources by many clients can be done once ago without feeling the slowness and unresponsiveness from the server. The response time will be almost instant.

The prefix pads system are the LCD displays system which indicates the calls and chat requests when the student is online and the total number of students who are accessing the system. The system will be of great help to assist the organization attend to the student in need of the support at almost real time. By so doing this will help the smooth communication outlay between the clients who are the students and the AusEd. 

Conclusion

The improvement of the information technology infrastructure to AusEd as explained and described above will help so much in meeting the large number of students who are joining the online based learning platform. This will help in smooth running of the process and also quality in service delivery. The students joined to the learning process will be satisfied and the quality of education and resource sharing will also be improved significantly the proposal above is implemented into the oraganisation.

I therefore recommend that the information infrastructure of AusEd be improved to meet the large number of students who are currently joining the system. 

References

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