biow@tove.cs.umd.edu (Christopher Biow) (11/01/90)
> I am interested in hearing of any experience, or articles available in > the computer press, dealing with remote administration of PC LANs. Can > products such as PC Remote and Carbon Copy be used to run the > administration programs for 3COM and other PC LANs? > > Chris Biow Since posting the above, I have recieved four replies, as well as two requests for me to post the info to the group. The following is the text from the replies. Since I didn't originally say that I'd summarize these, I am not including the individuals or company names. If anyone wants to contact the any of those who replied, please e-mail me, identifying which respondant you want, and I'll forward your message. -------------------------------------------------------------- We routinely use Carbon Copy to remotely administer AT&T StarLAN(tm) networks at our customer sites. We can run all of the same stuff we can run as a client or server user on site. We also use Carbon Copy to connect with one machine on the LAN and then use Brightworks' Net-Remote(tm) to multi-hop from that machine to others on the same network. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Christopher, I have used PC-Remote without problems for administration of both 3Com and Novell networks. In fact, there is a version specifically designed for Novell that allows "remoting" over the network itself rather than only dial-up. It is a standard part of our LAN install to make provisions for dial-up administration. Sure has saved a bunch of trips to the site! Please feel free to direct specific questions to me if you need further information. ------------------------------------------------------------------- The network monitor I work on (the LanProbe) is designed for remote management of lans. It comes in two pieces: then LanProbe (a dedicated box that is placed at the end of a segment) and ProbeView (an MS-Windows application that runs on a PC and displays the LanProbe infomation in a useful fashion). I can't really do it justice in a short letter, but it will show all sorts of statistics, call your PC through a modem when an alert or unusual event occurs, etc. Pretty handy really. The only problem is that it's not free (about $5000 or $8000 for the whole setup, I think - including the PC). The good news is that one ProbeView can manage many LanProbes. For more information on network management tools, take a look at RFC1147. If you can't find it, let me know and I'll find the address for you or something. --------------------------------------------------------------------- There are articles in PC Magazine on products that is use to administer LAN remotely. BUT none on the overall experience in doing this. I myself like to use Close-UP from Warner-Lambert. Can it be done practicaly? Yes, I'm doing it now for several clients succesfully. Every case is different in terms of what the user wanted. Is it just maintaining S/W, backup, and access rights? Or also manning hotline (user hand holding). You also have to be ingenius in designing the facility, such as how to handle a hung fileserver or gateway server. -----------------------------------------------------------------------