kieffer@UNCANET.BITNET (Rom Kieffer, TransCanada PipeLines) (07/26/90)
I have recently left my job as a communications manager at the local university to become a newly minted network planner for a country-wide network comprised of about 1000 Mac's and a couple dozen of Vaxes. Besides these systems we support Interbridges, Netserials, Netmodems, etc, all of it on Appletalk Version 1. The network is based on an ethernet backbone to which Mac's are attached via Starcontrollers and Gatorboxes/Fastpaths. Most of the equipment is located in a few locations linked via leased lines and bridges. Communications software in use includes Liaison, Pacerlink, Pacershare, etc. I have experienced various 'learning opportunities' so far, and I have the impression that there are more of them than I would like to see. I would like to compare notes with other network managers operating in environments of that size, to hear about the problems that were overcome in the administation, management and troubleshooting, and the tools and training courses that are useful in such an environment (public domain and proprietary). Security is one area that I am interested in also, for example anybody can run Watch and monitor Appletalk traffic at will. thanks rom