Employment of techniques to enhance the functionality of an Intranet

Seminar paper from the year 2000 in the subject Computer Science - Commercial Information Technology, grade: 1,7 (A-), UNITEC New Zealand (Information Systems), language: English, abstract: This report addresses the senior management of the e-Fence corporation. It deals largely with possibilities to enhance the functionality of the company's Intranet. In particular the focus is on the appliance of collaboration and network management techniques and solutions that add value to the corporation. In terms of collaboration techniques intelligent email-based messaging and discussion systems are described. They provide the basis for an improved communication among the departments and distinct employees. In particular the concept of newsgroups over NNTP protocols as well the IMAP protocol contribute significantly to the efficiency of the company by sharing calendars, resources as well as customized messaging-based applications (such as custom workflow management). Lotus's Domino-Notes solution is assessed as the most suitable groupware packet that dominates through its ease of integration, a broad range of features valuable for e-Fence and its low total cost of ownership. To generate performance reports of the servers within the corporate network performance management over SNMP protocol is the solution. Performance management as part of network management is capable to monitor the network devices, identify errors and allow initiating counter measures proactively. Tivoli's NetView solution is evaluated to add the highest contribution to the e-Fence Intranet. Its components and tools can be aggregated to a customized solution. The third part comprises the critically evaluation of an appropriate document management system that should enable the company to benefit from time and money savings. Lotus's Domino.doc is selected as the most suitable add-on product to the already proposed Domino-Notes solution. Finally, the principles of cost-effective Intranet management are presented. The highlight of this section is the fact that the total cost of ownership rather than the initial purchase price has to be considered when establishing or upgrading an Intranet. It counts for more than two third of all the expenses that can be expected from an IT investment.