Case Study Ringebu municipality

Case Study Ringebu municipality
Case Study
Ringebu municipality
“The solution has been entirely problem-free, and we are very pleased.”
Magnus Rønningen, ICT Technical Manager, Ringebu municipality
The challenge
Ringebu municipality, which is located in Midt-Gudbrandsdal, Norway,
has approximately 4,600 inhabitants. The municipality cooperates
with the neighbouring Sør-Fron municipality on several IT tasks, for
example the shared accountant’s office operated by Ringebu municipality, and the school and kindergarten operated by Sør-Fron municipality. This close cooperation offers an ongoing exchange of experiences and competences, and it was in this context that ICT Technical
Manager Magnus Rønningen was introduced to the Zero Client solution from Fujitsu.
The customer
• Small municipality in the centre of Norway
• Approx. 4,600 inhabitants
• Three employees and one apprentice in the
ICT department
The challenge
• The ICT department must serve a large number of users spread
over a large geographic area
• Considerable wear and tear on existing hardware
The solution
• Pilot solution tested at the Church Office:
PRIMERGY TX200 S6 and six Zero Client dZ22-2
• School solution:
PRIMERGY RX300 S6 and 40 Zero Client dZ22-2
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”Sør-Fron had started using Fujitsu Zero Clients at the Gudbrandsdalen
Occupational Health Services. They were so pleased with the solution
that they ordered a set of Zero Clients for a classroom at a lower secondary school in the municipality,” says Magnus Rønningen, ICT Technical Manager at Ringebu municipality.
”In an ICT department, we always want to use the best and most efficient solutions, and when the Church Office needed to upgrade its PCs,
it was a logical place to test whether Fujitsu’s Zero Client solution could
be something for us in Ringebu, too,” Rønningen explains.
The solution
Fujitsu Zero Client offers a complete, virtual infrastructure in a box. Office desks are only equipped with monitors, keyboards and mice,
which are connected to a shared server that runs virtual PCs. This offers
the users easy and secure access from identical units at different locations, and for the ICT department this means significantly reduced
administration and support.
”We ordered a solution with six Zero Clients for the Church Office. The
Church Office is a unit that has had very old equipment, so it was time
to make some replacements. At the same time, this was a small office
where we, in an easy manner, could really test the solution,” Rønningen says. ”The solution, which was delivered by Pitney Bowes, was
comprised of Fujitsu’s tower server PRIMERGY TX200 S6 with six Zero
Client dZ22-2. The solution was actually so easy to install that our apprentice installed it on his own, with only a little help from the rest of
us in the IT department. We also drew upon a few experiences from the
Zero Client installations that Sør-Fron municipality had performed before us.”
www.fujitsu.no
Case Study Ringebu municipality
Customer benefits
Products and services
• administration SECURITY – the ICT department can more easily
manage, monitor and maintain the PCs with virtualization
technology
• COST EFFICIENT – reduced need for administration and
maintenance, less travel time for the ICT department and reduced electricity usage
• SATISFIED USERS – users experience the PCs as more stable
coincided with increased flexibility
• PRIMERGY RX300 S6
• PRIMERGY TX200 S6
• Zero Client DZ22-2
ICT Technical Manager, Magnus Rønningen continues: ”We chose to
set up a separate server at the Church Office with its own VMware licence in order to integrate the server into our existing VMware environment. The server was placed at the Church Office because virtualization requires slightly more line capacity than we had available.
Nevertheless, the remote administration of the server and the clients
worked very well over the existing line. We set up the test solution in
November 2011, and it was put into full operation in January 2012.”
”Schools are smart places to use Fujitsu’s Zero Client. With fewer components, the PCs are less vulnerable to the heavy wear and tear school
PCs are subject to. Providing support is also much easier. We can easily set up a filter that prevents downloading of harmful software, and
the danger of theft is lower since there are no physical PCs in the
classroom,” Rønningen explains.
Good user experiences and less support
”We have tested the solution since November 2011, and our users are
very satisfied. They have really only noticed that they have a new and
more stable PC. And now they also have a flexibility that they did not
have before. By starting to use Fujitsu’s Zero Client, we are laying
down the fundamentals for an even more flexible, future scenario
where users can use home PCs or Fujitsu’s memory stick solution that
will allow users to log on from anywhere in order to gain access to his
or her own PC,” says a pleased Rønningen.
”The users experience a stable PC experience with increased flexibility”
Rønningen continues: ”Now we can, from remote, quickly determine
and solve an error if a user calls for support, as is not the case with
traditional PCs. We can monitor the status of each individual PC, and
if a PC is inoperable, it is easy to create a new virtual PC on the server.
And it only takes a few minutes. Going out and purchasing a new PC
and installing the software all over again is an operation that could
quickly take a full day – and not to mention the price tag for the
bundle.”
”Zero Client simplifies our workday”
In the school system
After having used Zero Client at the Church Office since November,
Ringebu municipality has purchased the Fujitsu Zero Client solution
for its schools as well, starting with 40 clients.
In cooperation with:
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Contact
Fujitsu Norway
Address: Østensjøveien 32, 0667 Oslo, Norway
Telephone: +47 23 24 80 00
Fax: +47 23 24 80 01
E-mail: firmapost@ts.fujitsu.com
Internet: www.fujitsu.no
March 2012
A modern school requires the utilisation of IT equipment in different situations, and using IT is easier for both students and teachers with Fujitsu’s
Zero Client. Rønningen continues: ”We can easily set up template PCs
during national tests that the students can use without being able to
cheat. General updates of new software can be done with one simple
keystroke for all of the PCs. Previously we had to run an individual operation on each PC.”
A more efficient workday
”We are three employees and one apprentice that are responsible for
nearly 600 PCs, so it is obvious that using Zero Client simplifies our
workday. And that we rarely have to travel out to the users when a PC
malfunctions saves us a lot of time and makes our workday much
more efficient. So far, the new solution has been entirely problem-free
and, in my opinion, this is a good use of the IT funds we have at our
disposal. I am very pleased,” concludes Magnus Rønningen, ICT Technical Manager at Ringebu municipality.
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