Australian Fisheries Management Authority - Case Study
Service Desk services and project work
OPC IT has been contracted to the Australian Fisheries Management Authority (‘AFMA’) for the provision of specialist IT services since 2005.
AFMA required OPC's expertise in a number of areas to ensure strategic business objectives were, and continue to be, met.
Background
AFMA is a Commonwealth government authority with close to 200 staff spread between the national office in Canberra and two regional branch offices located in Darwin and on Thursday Island. Key joint ventures include collaboration with the Australian Navy, Customs, Department of Agriculture, Fisheries, and Forestries and the CSIRO.
The AFMA datacenter is located within the Canberra office and houses some 48 multi vendor servers. The operating system is split between 30 Microsoft Windows 2003 servers, providing; file, print, email, and application services, and 18 RedHat Linux servers, ranging from version 7 through to the Enterprise Linux version 4 providing the vast majority of database services (Oracle and Ingres) and secure, internet facing systems.
The Challenges
OPC was initially required to assess, audit and document AFMA’s existing infrastructure. OPC developed a standard document covering key information areas such as hardware, operating system configuration, application level configuration, hardware and service availability and existing data recovery procedures.
Following the initial audit, OPC was tasked with identifying consolidation opportunities with the aim of significantly reducing the existing server environment footprint.
Our Solutions
OPC’s technical experts established a standard operating environment for both Microsoft Windows and RedHat Enterprise Linux environments which were designed to meet defined stability and security guidelines. These guidelines were developed utilising information gleaned from key Government Information Management documents including the Protective Security Manual (PSM) and the Australian Government information and Communications Technology Security Manual (ACSI33).
Detailed implementation plans were developed to migrate applications, databases and server system functionality to alternate hardware. Existing hardware was reprovisioned wherever possible.
OPC managed, and continues to manage, these complex migration projects resulting in excellent outcomes and financial benefits to AFMA. Such projects currently include the Vessel Management System, a system with interagency and nationwide ramifications which was developed to monitor all Australian fishing vessels through satellite tracking, and an Authority financial management package upgrade which includes new hardware platforms and the reprovisioning of all financial data into the new system.
Significant financial benefits have also been realised through the implementation of fewer software licenses. OPC has, where required, coordinated meetings with third party vendors, produced license and contract audit reports and identified best fit products and requirements to better assist the Authority.
Overarching the consolidation plans, OPC has made several recommendations to AFMA relating to the implementation of virtualisation technology with its associated benefits such as rapid provisioning, templated server configuration and pre-test server snapshotting, disaster recovery and desktop/DSOE management using Novell ZENworks Configuration Management with Endpoint Security.
The Result
“The OPC onsite team has performed professionally and expediently throughout the implementation of these plans and has kept our internal IT team abreast of all aspects at all times. AFMA’s infrastructure has benefited from OPC’s technical expertise and through this successful collaboration we have greatly improved our organisational efficiencies.
We have confidence in OPC’s project management skills and look forward to continuing our relationship with them in the future.”
Ms Tanya Rattenbury - IT Operations Manager
