Computing and Communications
Application for the 2009 Larry L. Sautter Award
for Innovation in Information Technology
James Reserve/UCR Network Connection
Project Summary
UCR supports six remote research stations that are a part of the University of
California Natural Reserve System. These five stations are located within a 200 mile
radius of campus, and all suffer from a common malady: sub-optional network
connectivity and the associated costs of replicating key network infrastructures and
services that already exist on the main campus. During the past 12 months,
Computing and Communications, in partnership with the James Reserve and key
college leaders, has connected the James Reserve to core campus network, doubling
the Reserve’s network capacity and reducing cost by leverage various main campus
systems.
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Background
Several years ago, the staff at the James Reserve began to express an interest in
getting directly connected to UCR’s campus network. Their desire was to increase
the data bandwidth availability and redundancy, as well as to improve the voice
service quality. Equally so, they wanted to reduce their monthly recurring data
service cost to a local Internet Service Provider and to reduce their monthly voice
services cost to their local carrier.
Previous Solution
The James Reserve site relied on a local Internet Service Provider for access to any
data sites or any services outside their own facility. This placed responsibility for
services such as DNS on the staff at James Reserve.
Data connectivity was via a single T-1 circuit with no data circuit failure
survivability.
Voice was a combination of vendor-supplied Measured Business lines and a voice
Centrex service.
Voice or data problems had to be handled by the site staff to the detriment of their
primary responsibilities.
Unique Challenges and Alternatives
The James Reserve location involved several challenges: its remote geographical
location, limited available transport technologies, cost controls and specific site
requirements. Several alternatives were explored and analyzed including the
following: radio hops to Mt. Palomar, Box Springs Mountain, and Deep Canyon
Reserve; point-to-point T1s; and a satellite solution encompassing several other
reserve sites.
New Solution
Ultimately, because of cost and technical feasibility constraints, the team decided to
wait for the final solution. The final design utilizes the high-speed redundant network
connection at the UCR Palm Desert Graduate Center, plus dual point-to-point T1s to
the reserve, thus significantly reducing original mileage costs back to UCR’s main
campus. Compared against all other solutions, this provides the ‘best fit’ results, and
it meets the Reserve’s main objectives of reducing cost while improving voice and
data services. In sum, the completion of the redundant fiber paths to the UCR Palm
Desert Graduate Center and the CALNET 2 agreement made the final solution the
best solution for all objectives.
Project Highlights
 Voice services are now provided over IP via the PBX on the UCR campus.
This supplies five digit dialing, voicemail, conference services, reduced toll
charges, E911, etc., just as if the James Reserve phones were located on the
UCR campus.
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 Local control for specific onsite systems remains with James Reserve.
 Remote management of University-located systems are built into the design,
and the James Reserve staff will be able to adjust services like DNS just as
easily as if those services were local to their site.
 The University now provides beneficial managed services in areas where the
James Reserve staff needed relief to attend to other, primary responsibilities.
 The bandwidth supporting the site is doubled and is carried over two
independent links, which terminate at the nearby Palm Desert Graduate
Center. Load balancing is in effect, so that a failure of either link will not
result in an outage for the site.
 Redundancy exists at the link termination points at the Palm Desert Graduate
Center, as well as through dual paths out of Idyllwild. In the event of a failure
of the primary link, an equal, secondary path will take over the transport of all
James Reserve’s voice and data traffic. This ‘backup’ path is constantly
available, and ‘primary path’ failure is tested at regular intervals.
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Project Diagram
Testimonials
“The cost of the new CALNET 2 connection is 1/3 the cost of the old James Reserve
connection which has greatly helped out our limited budgets, a key feature that we
hope other Reserves can also enjoy.”
“We have had success with the phones and the sound provided is very clear and
actually better than the old analog phone system.”
“UCR’s ability to provide us with an entire IP subnet was greatly appreciated and we
have successfully transferred all our DNS management to UCR’s name servers as
well.”
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“We are also very pleased at how well the NEC gateway has performed at getting all
the analog handsets on the VOIP network.”
“We also appreciate that fact that we are now part of the UCR network infrastructure;
this makes communicating with campus must easier.”
“We have been very pleased with the support that UCR has provided; they have
been very helpful in accommodating our unique requirements and have provided
invaluable technical support as well as answering all of our detailed questions.”
“We hope that this deployment will help with future installations at other UCR
reserves.”
Project Team Members
Glenn Bradley
Kevin Brown
Jason Byrne
Bob Grant
Jill Hishmeh
Eugene Ho
Ola Olowolafe
Tim Paul
Ron Potts
Julie Slusser
Ana Trujillo
Importance and Relevance to Other Reserve Sites
UCR has 5 other remote Reserve sites for which the costs for providing data and
voice services are extremely high. They all have expressed an interest for
increasing their data bandwidth and reducing their communication costs.
Vision for the future
UCR will revisit the Reserve sites and evaluate the feasibility for a similar solution.
Visit James Reserve Site
http://www.Jamesreserve.edu/
Submitted by
Jill Hishmeh
Director, Communication Services
UC Riverside Computing & Communications
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