Eirgrid
Highly available remote access Citrix XenApp Solution
Introduction
EirGrid plc is the independent electricity Transmission System Operator (TSO) in Ireland and the Market Operator in the wholesale electricity trading system.
EirGrid's role is to deliver services to generators, suppliers and customers across the high voltage electricity system, and to put in place the grid infrastructure needed to support Ireland's economy.
EirGrid has approximately 250 highly-skilled staff and contractors who work on the operation of the electricity market and power system and, with the Regulators and System Operators, Northern Ireland, on the development of a new All Island Market for Electricity.
The Challenge
The EBS employs a number of bespoke applications that are critical to the successful day to day running of its business. Some of these applications are developed in-house by the EBS IT department.
The Eirgrid IS Infrastructure department delivers an array of applications to the main business areas within EirGrid. The applications range from standard office productivity applications to business critical applications. Foremost of these critical resources is a suite of real-time applications which provide up to date information about the transmission network twenty four hours a day. All of these applications were being delivered via Citrix Metaframe XP, which had been adopted by Eirgrid in early 2005.
This implementation of Citrix Metaframe XP was originally scoped and sized to deliver just five applications to less than twenty users. However, the benefits of server based computing and application virtualisation were quickly recognised by the business, thus the number of applications and Citrix users quickly increased. This rapid increase in use of the Citrix Metaframe XP environment consequently brought with it an increase in the number of related support calls.
Implication
With Citrix Metaframe XP reaching its end of life (i.e. no longer supported by Citrix), coupled with a desire to reduce Citrix related support calls, the Eirgrid IS Infrastructure department decided to upgrade their Citrix estate. It was essential that the new Citrix implementation would deliver an improved user experience while reducing the volume of related support calls.
An additional key requirement of the new Citrix environment was the implementation of a reliable remote access solution. High availability would be vital to the entire Citrix environment, as it is imperative that the business critical applications are available in the event of a disaster.
Solution
The EBS engaged Maxima Ireland to assist them in finding and implementing a suitable solution. After Eirgrid engaged Maxima to assist them in designing and implementing a Citrix XenApp solution that would meet all of their requirements. Consultative sessions commenced with the goal of defining the exact requirements and how best they would be achieved.
With a full understanding of Eirgrid's requirements, Maxima designed a solution that incorporated a highly available Citrix XenApp solution for application virtualisation and a highly available Citrix Access Gateway solution for remote access.
Maxima installed multiple Citrix XenApp servers, built to exacting best practice standards, across two separate Eirgrid sites. These servers allow Eirgrid to virtualise their applications and host them securely in the datacentre, thus realising the many benefits of application virtualisation such as reduced cost of application management, rapid delivery of applications to users, enhanced application security and application high availability.
Maxima deployed Citrix Web Interface servers across the two sites to present the applications to the users. Citrix Web Interface enables users to access applications by simply browsing to an internal webpage. High availability is achieved by deploying multiple Web Interface servers across the two Eirgrid sites.
A substantial amount of the support calls associated with the preceding Citrix Metaframe XP environment were related to corrupt user profiles. To alleviate user profile issues and to provide an improved user experience, Maxima implemented a hybrid profile solution in the new Citrix XenApp environment.
For the remote access component of the overall solution, Maxima installed multiple Citrix Access Gateway devices with Citrix Advanced Access Control servers across the two sites. RSA SecurID was integrated to provide two factor authentication.
This solution allows Eirgrid users to securely access corporate applications via the internet. Citrix Access Gateway provides the Eirgrid IS Department with a single point of control to manage access based on both the user and the endpoint device, providing better risk, security and compliance management. Deploying multiple Citrix Access Gateway devices across two sites provides high availability in the event there is a disaster at one of the locations.
Through its adoption of Citrix XenApp and Citrix Access Gateway, Eirgrid now has a flexible, highly available, reliable and high performing application virtualisation platform that will continue to benefit the business as it grows and changes in the future.
Technical Benefits
- Rapid delivery of corporate applications
- Enhanced security - applications are in the datacentre
- High availability - critical components in multiple sites providing disaster recovery capabilities
- High performance - applications are accessed over optimized ICA protocol
- Deliver applications to any device, anywhere.
Business Benefits
- Reduced cost of application delivery and management
- XenApp increases the businesses agility to respond to change in today's increasingly dynamic world.
- Business continuity in the event of a disaster
Why Maxima?
Maxima is dedicated to providing a professional service or solution that is aligning to the objectives of the business. Maxima has a wealth of knowledge and experience in both Virtualisation and Business Intelligence with key vendor relationships with Citrix, Microsoft, VMware, Business Objects, SAP and Oracle and has offices in Ireland, UK and in the States.
