FORT EUSTIS, Va. (USTCNS) --- Reach out and touch someone, a popular advertising jingle of the not too distant past, could soon be the new Deployment Support Command Information Management mantra.
The days of the computer specialist visiting your workstation are numbered. Soon, the IM team will be able to remotely install, delete, or update software; fix computer glitches; and inventory the desktop systems without ever entering your office.
DSC is on the cutting edge of implementing a U.S. Army initiative that utilizes the Unicenter program from Computer Associates International Inc. This program oversees operations by remotely monitoring and maintaining information technology management processes, resources, and events, according to Dennis Van Langen, DSC's deputy chief of staff for information management.
Working cooperatively with the Army's Unicenter TNG-The Next Generation- User's Group, DSC IM is leveraging state of the art enterprise management technology to augment DSC's technical capabilities while reducing costs of systems administration.
"Enterprise management of technology resources has a big role to play in DSC's future," said Van Langen. "IM is very excited about the possibilities-we're looking at improved desktop support, cost savings from better configuration management, and faster response times on our servers.
"On a daily basis, our users will see a new 'Advanced help Desk' which is more responsive to their support requirements," Van Langen stated. "Additionally, we're looking forward to command-wide improvements in our communications and planning abilities.
"All in all, this year is looking pretty exciting for the IM aspects of DSC," added Van Langen.
Unicenter will first access and maintain workstations within the DSC headquarters and soon afterwards branch out to cover those same functions command-wide. The program will allow central management and the ability to pinpoint problems even before the users are affected.
According to Ernest Lawhorn, a DSC computer specialist and point man for the project here, the initial program installation was completed in July.
"All that remains to be done is the installation of the options, such as software delivery and asset management," Lawhorn explained.
The software delivery option enables IM to remotely install or update new programs on the desktop systems throughout the building. Gone will be the days of a technician visiting each workstation to manually insert the CD-ROM or floppy disc to install a program.
Soon that same, time-consuming, work-interrupting task will be done remotely at night on all the computers simultaneously.
"Asset management not only inventories our systems but also alerts us to potential problems and provides an opportunity to take action before they affect the system," said Lawhorn. "Because of these various system tip-offs, users should experience far fewer problems."
"So far, this program has alerted us to imminent situations that could result in a crash of the installation's network long before the post itself even knew about them," Lawhorn added. "We were able to call them and deflect the system outage."
Unicenter will be fully operational at DSC by the end of the year, according to Lawhorn. DSC subordinate units and ports should be up and running early next year.
"We will be able to remotely install programs and proactively detect and correct problems at Sunny Point, N.C., for example, as easily as we can do those same things right in this building," said Lawhorn.
"Many might remember the problem we experienced about six months ago when one of our hard drives went down and a lot of people lost files and other vital information," Lawhorn mentioned. "Had Unicenter been operational, it would have detected and alerted us in time to fix the problem."
Explaining further, Lawhorn said, "In fact, even if no tech support were on duty at the time, the system is sophisticated enough to have alerted us via our two-way pagers and we could have sent a coded signal back that would have triggered the machine to reset itself."
Lawhorn and Van Langen are also highly respected charter members of the U.S. Army Unicenter TNG User's Group. Because of their wide-ranging experience with the system, they have provided immeasurable assistance to the group and in turn, to users Army wide who are just now beginning the implementation process. (FROM MILITARY TRAFFIC MANAGEMENT COMMAND, DEPLOYMENT SUPPORT COMMAND PUBLIC AFFAIRS).
