Every day, the Exchange server handles between 3000 and 7000 messages. In
24 hours, the crew typically transmits about 1000 messages off ship and receives
an equal number from land. To support all the messaging traffic, the Navy
replaced the Vinson's existing Exchange server, a homegrown 100MHz Pentium
server that had 64MB of RAM and 4GB of storage, with a new Compaq 200MHz Pentium
Pro server with 396MB of RAM and an 18GB RAID array.
"We're really proud of the new Exchange server because migrating from
Microsoft Mail to Microsoft Exchange during the middle of a Western Pacific/Persian Gulf deployment was quite interesting," laughs Bowley. "When
we were on deployment in the Persian Gulf, we were one of the few ships in the
Navy that maintained an Internet mail link with the US. To say that this benefit
was an incalculable morale boost would probably be an understatement," said
Bowley. The ship sent and received more than 5000 Internet messages a day while
in the Persian Gulf. In all, the Vinson processed nearly 1.2 million email
messages during deployment in the Gulf.
The upgrade plan called for migrating one department from MS Mail to
Exchange every week. The IS team delivered a set of upgrade instructions to all
users. Of course, not every user followed all the instructions as carefully as
Bowley would have liked. The team was able to handle some problems over the
phone and use tools such as Systems Management Server (SMS). However, many
problems required visiting various sites around the ship. The ship's vast size
and intense level of activity while deployed made for some long days. "If
you're a network administrator, you know what I mean. I think a lot of my gray
hair is the result of that migration," says Bowley.
While at sea, the Vinson's network communicates with the US via the CA 3
Challenge Athena satellite system. The ship routes communications through Hawaii
to Florida, and then to the rest of the country. The system performs well, and
routinely permits email to travel from the ship to its destination in two to
four hours.
At times during deployment in the Persian Gulf, the ship experienced
transmission rates of four minutes. "Sometimes, it was almost chat-like,"
said Bowley. "We had a very generous bandwidth allocation because the
ship's chain of command realized the importance of giving the crew the ability
to communicate with their families."
In addition to email access, Web access is important. The Navy wanted to
expand the network and provide more services, such as Web access. "I'd say
about 200 of our clients run Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator.
About 50 of those clients have complete Web access; the rest are restricted
through Microsoft Proxy Server," said Bowley. Users on the ship regularly
access Web sites such as USA Today, CNN, Navy Online, and The Bureau of Naval
Personnel. The Navy Personnel site is particularly important because it contains
the latest instructions, policies, and advancement exam results. "The news
sites were extremely popular while we were deployed to the Arabian Gulf as part
of Operation Desert Strike," reports Bowley. "The Web access permitted
the crew to keep in touch with current events as they were happening, and this
capability contributed very positively to morale."
Looking Ahead to the 21st Century
What's next for the Gold Eagle LAN? The Vinson's IS team is busy preparing
to migrate many clients to NT Workstation 4.0 with Office 97. They're also
deploying a corporate-style intranet aboard ship. Each department will have a
set of Web pages for instructions and information. The IS team will use Adobe
Acrobat and other Web publishing tools to create links to other pages on and off
ship. "One department has already created an Adobe-based chain of command,
important instructions, and standard operating procedures, all in hyperlinked
text with imbedded photographs," said Bowley.
The USS Carl Vinson is a strong case for the IT-21 concept because the ship
is deploying standard technology quickly and to great effect. NT has helped in
many areas. "For us, it was a quantum leap," says Bowley, "I
don't know how we did our jobs before."