Backup Internet Connection for Cloud Storage

[abillybob]

Hi Guys

 

So the SLT are thinking about going full cloud based in the near future to help with costs and stuff.

 

The deputy has asked about having a backup internet connection just in case our main internet drops we have something to fall back on. I'm not 100% clued up on this. Currently we are supplied broadband through county and have a in house Smoothwall server being used as our proxy.

 

Is there anyway to be able to have a separate internet connection coming to the school just in case of a drop out that Smoothwall will automatically switch to if county's internet fails? I'm thinking like this as proxy settings are setup in group policy and if we just have a standard internet connection that doesn't require a proxy it means that the client computers won't get internet anyway until someone manually turns off the proxy settings.

 

Any idea's spring to mind please fire them my way!

 

Cheers

[matt40k]

What's your current uptime like? First port of call would be your current ISP - so county - do they offer a backup. If you've got a lease line, they normally have a option to have a ADSL\fibre backup connection, or if you've got ADSL\fibre, a 3G connections - its all handled at the (hopefully managed) router, so you don't have to do anything.

[Steve21]

Any idea's spring to mind please fire them my way!

 

Cheers

 

There's options built into Smoothie, however have you considered what you do if the Smooth goes down? If you're going full cloud I'd certainly be thinking either 2 Smooths (or at least one virtual) so if it drops off you don't lose the network either

 

Steve

[mikes]

We are thinking about this too, let us know if you come up with a solution.

 

Ours is this - a lot of stuff is cloud - it is Office 365 and Google Apps (mixed across depts) - however our county broadband is less than reliable. Our Country broadband is our primary and only provider. We wished to swap over to BT infinity and ditch the council entirely (due to budget) but apparently our money for the LEA internet is budgeted strictly for the Internet - so we will have to pay again for a BT infinity line, so essentially we will be paying twice.

I thought (and hoped) that the money we paid for our LEA internet was for JANET external access only - we could stop paying that, keep our internal LEA link, and go with a BT infinity dual line in. but we are being told - get rid of LEA internet and we will not keep the money that paid for it. Is this normal?

Our council are dead against us moving away from them; you would think they would prefer it as it is less work for them?

I would rather keep it in house but our IT/DT staff are very cloud enthusiastic so I don't mind letting them have a punt with it, see how it pans out. If the LEA link goes down for a few days they can send the students home and have them work from there