Remote computing is an established solution for teams that need access to shared applications. While ‘remote’ is often taken to mean off-premise, it can also refer to infrastructure that sits within the organisation.
This is an attractive option where a business unit (such as a team of specialist modelling engineers within a larger organisation) demands more specialist support than can be provided by their IT department.
In this case, the team uses a secure link to on- or off-premise servers to run its applications.
ac&e specialises in delivering this kind of ‘private cloud’ solution. By working closely with clients to gain a deep understanding of their software requirements, ac&e is better placed to guarantee a scalable and secure service than the often-anonymous vendors such as Amazon Web Services or Microsoft Azure.
To demonstrate this close partnership approach, ac&e recently supported a series of run time tests to look at optimal configurations for the deployment of catchment modelling software in the water industry. The tests included on- and off-premise solutions, deploying both normal CPUs and GPUs, with the findings published in a series of blog posts by Andrew Walker, Client Service Manager at Innovyze.
What the results showed was the flexibility and scalability of ac&e’s cloud solution which is built around the specific demands of the client software. Benefits such as the rapid implementation of upgrades and optimisation of configurations deliver real business continuity. The most recent of Andrew Walker’s blog posts, of July 24th 2017 Operating InfoWorks ICM on Virtual Machines and in Cloud based environments, explains the approach taken in the tests:
“The software was installed in the usual way and then pointed to the location of the workgroup database and license server. Where it was deployed on the cloud platform, the workgroup database was also hosted on the same virtual platform in order to keep data transfer times to a minimum.”
The arrangement with ac&e provided Innovyze with a cloud platform to test the InfoWorks ICM application and compare the performance across different configurations. The findings showed that the performance of the remote solution is highly comparable with the performance of one of the fastest machines at the Innovyze office.
Andrew Walker continues:
“These tests show, above all else, the benefits that cloud based systems offer in terms of scalability and runtime performance … enabled partly by the evolution in GPU technology, which is delivering faster and more powerful cards. Another major change within the last 12-18 months has been a move away from physical hardware in preference to the adoption of virtual (cloud based) hardware platforms within corporate IT environments.”
ac&e is the ideal technical partner for teams that are seeking speed, scalability and security when using specialist applications remotely. If you would like more details of the physical hardware or virtual environment employed to conduct these tests, you can contact John Baxter of ac&e.
This was a blog post prepared in August 2017 with the assistance of Andrew Walker of Innovyze.
