Education | Wright State University

Adonis 1000 DNS/DHCP Appliance™ Moves to the Head of the Class at Wright State University

BACKGROUND

Named for Dayton, Ohio’s aviation pioneers, Orville and Wilbur Wright, Wright State University recognizes innovation when they see it. Wright State University is dedicated to teaching, research, and service and serves nearly 16,000 students with programs leading to more than 100 under graduate and nearly 50 Ph.D., graduate and professional degrees.

OPPORTUNITY

David Markey, Senior Network Engineer with Computing and Telecommunications Services (CaTS) has the job of maintaining the seven different domains that comprise the university’s network. Their network relies on DNS for many different types of applications such as UNIX, TN3270 and Novell connectivity, email, and many more.

Wright State had been using the BIND service on an older VMS system to manage their network; Markey needed to update both the platform and the version of BIND that he was using. Also, the system that they had in place for maintaining these servers was difficult and time consuming, and he was, “looking for a better way to modify DNS and DHCP tables other than just manually editing the files.”

SOLUTION

After plugging in the Adonis 1000 DNS/DHCP Appliance™, management was simplified through the Adonis Management Console. This cross-platform graphic interface allows access to all of the Adonis functions, and according to Markey, “once you get used to it, which doesn’t take long, it’s very easy to use.”,/p>

When managing DHCP addresses for more than 10,500 hosts and managing DNS for more than 12,500 entries, systems become complex and small errors can be magnified. The previous system that Wright State had in place involved manual editing and reloading of both the DNS and DHCP tables. Additional information was kept in a spreadsheet that was used to check each entry. Zone transfers were done manually. Adonis includes with it a set of tools that has made all of this a thing of the past.

The Adonis Data Check utility can be used to ensure that all of the data on the server is right the first time. Data can be examined for syntax errors before going live, and can also be checked live to ensure that the DNS entries actually refer to real locations. Markey also liked the built-in packet filtering firewall on the Adonis 1000, and is anticipating better uptime for the networks that make up Wright State University’s computing resources.

IMPACT

With the Adonis 1000, Markey noted an increase in data accuracy. He was impressed by the way that the data checking utilities were able to ferret out incorrect DNS entries and duplicate MAC addresses in the DHCP tables.

Adonis has been integrated into the university’s network, and now provides their main DNS/DHCP management. Markey comments that the integration process went very smoothly, but wherever issues arose, “the support folks talked me through it and I had it running quickly.”

At Wright State University, Adonis, from BlueCat Networks, has moved to the head of the class.