Brilliant idea

Dear Editor,
Congratulations on the October 2002 issue of Network Magazine. The decision to print a collection of case studies was a brilliant idea. I especially found the article on Hero Honda's server architecture very worthwhile. Many enterprises have well-structured server architectures, but it's important to tweak the architecture every now and then to get the best out of it. Otherwise the administrator is faced with the task of continuously upgrading the
hardware for minimal performance gains.
Sudhir Rajak
Hyderabad

Dear Sudhir,
Thank you for appreciating the previous issue of Network Magazine. I am glad that you found the article on Hero Honda's server architecture interesting. It's true that many enterprises spend large amounts to build redundant server architectures but sometimes miss out on the chance to get more out of the existing investment. Regular tweaks and server consolidation exercises can get a lot more out of the systems than the existing performance levels.

Data warehouse

Dear Soutiman,
Your article 'A warehouse of value' in the October 2002 issue was interesting and informative. It seems a data warehouse seems to be an exercise only possible for large enterprises, due to the high cost. It's difficult for a small company to invest in data warehousing.
Manish Prasad
Bangalore

Dear Manish,
Thank you for your observations. Data warehousing is possible for a company of any size. It's a technology which can be applied wherever there are servers with organized data stored in them. And the results can be used to garner a number of benefits. In a practical scenario it's only worth the while and the investment for a large organization to implement a data warehouse. A small organization does not need such an intricate study of its data. In Godrej Consumer Products Limited's case, for example, data warehousing tools are mostly used for analysis and trends that allow the company to create short- and long-term strategies and business problem solutions. The company also feels that you can view interesting trends in sales and costs.

WLAN

Dear Soutiman,
Your article on WLANs was
informative. However the cost of WLAN equipment is still very high. The data transfer rates are also not very high compared to a wired infrastructure. Do you really think that this technology will take off?
Sunil Subramanium
Chennai

Dear Sunil,
Thank you for appreciating the article on WLANs. The cost of WLAN equipment has come down a lot over the last 12 months and the technology has also matured. I agree that compared to a wired LAN the costs are high, but the real question is why do you actually need WLAN? If you deploy WLAN for use on your desktop workstation which does not need to relocated, it's not a good idea. Use WLAN if you're on the move, your new office does not permit breaking walls to install cable, or you have to move around in your warehouse to take physical inventory. Technology for technology's sake is not the aim. The aim is to use technology for business' sake.