While plenty of companies spend a lot of time talking about ‘the potential’ or ‘the future’ of Open Source computing, Auckland-based Network Service Providers (NSP) is actually ‘doing’ Open Source.
NSP is New Zealand’s leading Linux house and has developed a number of world-first Linux-based applications. In fact, they have developed a full suite of Debian Linux-based firewalls and network management servers as well as a powerful high speed internet access (HSIA) package, Uplink, which is optimised for NZ’s burgeoning hospitality sector.
“Open Source computing is perfect for New Zealand,” says NSP Director, Brent Larsen. “It is extremely robust, incredibly flexible, relatively inexpensive and it operates on commodity equipment. What more could you ask for? What we do at NSP is to take existing Linux functionality – which has been tried and tested over time – and incorporate it into a standardised framework for specific applications. The result is a suite of fully-supported server solutions specifically for the New Zealand marketplace.”
NSP is one of the few organisations worldwide that has successfully blended both Linux and Microsoft together. “We’ve taken the best from both platforms,” says Larsen, “to architect solutions for our customers that deliver real value. With a hybrid environment, IT managers can realise back-end benefits, such as more robust performance, better utilisation of equipment and the reduction of traditional license fees, without compromising front-end usability.”
Case Studies:
VircomEMS
Business:
VirCom EMS has offices in Auckland, Nelson and Rangiora and carries out nationwide meter testing and certification for existing and new sites and reconnection/disconnection services for electricity retailers and meter owners
Solution:
VirCom EMS manages all service orders by email – uptime is critical to their business. NSP installed and maintains a network of Linux-based mail servers with full Xen-based redundancy. Since installation, failover has been trimmed to 90 sec; work is underway testing a new revolutionary approach to reduce this to 200 ms.