SERVER MAINTENANCE

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Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................1
1.

Describe and evaluate the fundamental of server technology use within business............2

2.

Describe server network infrastructure, hardware and protocols and services...................5

3.

Discuss Linux vs Windows and any other OS which are used by modern businesses.......7

4.

Why server hardware and software are different from normal computers.........................8

5.

Discuss various editions of the windows server and Linux, which one would you

recommend for the organisation.................................................................................................9

6.

Discuss if the organisation could go for VPS ORD CLOUD- limitations of VPS and

advantages of local servers.......................................................................................................10

Conclusion and Recommendation............................................................................................11
References................................................................................................................................12

Introduction
In server technology, a server is a computer program or device which provides services to
other computer programs. These other programs are called clients and this mode is called
Server-Client model. Normally, the computer which runs this server programs is referred as a
server. This server receives request from client and fulfils it. An application can function as a
client for some request or can function as a server for another process. Server functionalities
are named as services. These services includes performing computation, providing data,
sharing resources with multiple clients. Server-client relationship is many to many
relationship. A single client can request from multiple servers and a single server can serve
multiple clients. Servers and clients can be on same device or on different device. Client
process can run on the same device or can be connected to multiple servers over network.
File servers, print servers, database servers, web servers, mail server, game server and
application servers are different types of servers.

1. Describe and evaluate the fundamental of server technology use within business

Client-server architecture are implemented by request-response model. Client sends the

request to server and then server works on it and sends back the response to the client.
Computer which works as a server is designated as server class hardware. It is more reliable
and powerful than normal computers. Many large computing clusters can be composed by
small, replaceable computers.
Technically, server is device which runs several programs on the network. This is termed as
host here. In contrast to peer to peer model, client server relationship is different. In peer-topeer model all computers serve each other on demand. Server specifically serve a special
request on demand from client. For example a file server shares file with clients and a web
server provides a base for web. Internet is consist of millions of servers. Entire internet
technology is based on client server relationship (Peschansky and Kovalenko, 2015).
Uses of servers for businesses:
Mobile Computing: Many employees work from remote locations. Carrying a location at
every place is not possible from them. Providing technology and all applications on the
mobile could be of great use. They can connect and use applications on-the-go. Without any
complexity and configuration this facility will make devices smarter.
Virtualization: virtualization is used by every data center in the world. All sizes of companies
are converting their physical data infrastructures to virtual hosts. Coming era is an entirely
virtual hosted infrastructure. Virtualization provides money saving techniques to use system.

Cloud Computing: it is closely tied to mobile computing and virtualization. It is providing

better hardware and software facilities at lesser cost and lesser complexities. It gives you
option to share resources among different units of businesses.

Web-based Applications: A single computer cannot host all applications. The future of clientserver model is internet. All the applications will be server based. Client software and all
other applications will remain on a remote server, which will shared over web by other
clients.
Online storage: It gives you power to save your data online. It can be accessed from multiple
locations (Natesan and Jardine, 2004).
Virtual Desktop: You can access hardware and software without installing them on your
system.
Libraries: Printed part can be removed from the company. As all the data will be available
just on a click on your desktop.
Types of servers useful for businesses:
Application Server: it is used to host web apps and allow users in the network to run them.
These server should be a part or wold wide web,
Catalogue Server: It is used to maintain table or index of information shared across the
clients.
Communication Server: It maintains the endpoints for the communication needed between
two clients. Communication directory may or may not be included in it.
Computing Server: Share resources for computing purpose.
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Database server: This shares data among various clients. It reduces redundancy of the data
and keep updating about new data entry.
File server: Shares files and folder over the network.
Mail server: Provides email communication among the clients through a common server.
Print Server: Share printers (Perry and Posner, 2001).
Web Server: Host web. Makes World Wide Web accessible to all clients.

2. Describe server network infrastructure, hardware and protocols and services.

Client-server model partitioned extra workload among different servers connected over a
network. This is a distributed application. Mostly client and server communicate over a
network but they both can reside in a single machine also. Server hosts data and applications
and share them with clients on demand (Mishra and Mishra, 2008).
Hardware required for Server-client infrastructure are:
Nodes per cluster: Nodes are required for highly available and reliable deployment. It must
be odd number of nodes to maintain balance.
No of cores per node: if application is designed to tackle a lot of load than there should be
cores available at each database. If CPU is utilising most of the CPU storage than it will help
to distribute the load.
RAM: RAM decides the capacity of your system. If server is handling more clients than it
should have larger RAN. It will help to increase the process speed and to share the load
equally on the memory.
Storage: This is permanent storage used to store data and files of all clients. It is very
essential in case of files server and database servers. Clients will access all these files by
requesting servers for it. Maintain record of all clients will take a lot of memory.
Ephemeral Storage: This is used to store replicable data, files and log file clusters.
Network: Interface network is required to process application requests. This network helps in
storage access and cluster communication. Use high data Ethernet equipment to share large
data by server (Kreimer and Mehrez, 2003).
Software Requirements:

Operating System: OS is required to run applications. It will deploy all applications. There
can be special servers for clients and servers based on performance requirement. GUI, Data
accessibility, application interface etc. might differ for the two.
Services of Client Server Model:
Enhanced Data Sharing: Data is shared for the business purpose and maintained on the server
to make it available for all the client users.
Integrated Services: all the applications and information is available at server for client use.
Client need not to login or use another system for that. All information is easily available on
the server. Desktop users can use tools with information shared on servers without any
additional software or hardware.
Sharing resources over Diverse Devices: applications can be installed or used without any
hardware requirement or any technical complexities. Operating systems or application are
independent of any hardware.
Data Interoperability and Interchangeability: Client-server model enables sharing of data
across servers and clients (Koyanagi and Kawai, 2008).

3. Discuss Linux vs Windows and any other OS which are used by modern businesses

Topic
Ease

Linux
Windows
of Linux require understanding of the Windows GUI is user friendly. Any

Use

system at the initial stage. It has steep new person can easily use it by just
learning

curve.

Troubleshooting clicking on icons provided.

Price

problems can be more complicated.

Linux is an open source operating User needs to buy window OS by

Reliability

system. It is free of cost.

paying a huge fee.
It is focused on process management For making it more user friendly it is
which makes it more secure and losing on reliability.

Software

reliable.
Software

packages

are

easily Window has largest number of users

available for installation. It supports and thus softwares available. But,

large set of softwares. These are open some needs to be buy.
Hardware

source and free.

Initially Linux was facing issues with Manufacturers

prefer

window

hardware as no one was taking because of its large customer base.

interest in this OS. Now almost all
the manufacturers give Linux the
Security

same priority.
Linux is open for all users for It is target of most coders. Security
modifications which makes it easier softwares need to but for protection.

Support

to identify mistakes and corrections.

Massive support for Linux

Use Case

help system for information

It is used by academians, Scientific Window is mostly choice of general

Window has online and integrated

and corporates. It is also used for users, gamers who mostly rely on
development machines like google, Microsoft products.
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NASA etc.
4. Why server hardware and software are different from normal computers
(Give some examples of server hardware and software. Look on Dell/HP.)
Many people may think that a server is no different from a normal computer which is not
true. Although any computer which satisfy minimum requirements can work as a server but
that alone will not make a server. Even with same processing capacity and storage, any
computer cannot be a server. A desktop is designed to use OS and applications on that
desktop only. Server carry out task for other computers (Kocuk, Sivrikaya, and BaykalGrsoy, 2013). The main differences are:
Server Hardware: Server has a specific processor to handle all client requests. It has a
dedicated input configuration. Servers manages many requests at the same time, so it needs
more memory and storage capacity. Some server hardware are SCSI hard drives, SATA etc.
Server hardware should be of better quality. Otherwise it will affect larger number of users.
Server Operating System: Operating system should be a platform compatible for all
applications. GUI and accessibility of the OS should be user friendly for all staff members of
the business. Servers have more powerful OS that can handle multiple tasks simultaneously.
Window Small Business Server is helpful for small businesses. OS X server is offered by
Mac. Client Access Licenses (CALs) is another software which allows clients to access the
server.
Dell offers PowerEdge Tower Servers for small businesses and PowerEdge Rack Server for
high performing computing requirements. Blade Server is most powerful server solution by
Dell. HP offers ProLiant Gen9 server along with all other servers.

5. Discuss various editions of the windows server and Linux, which one would you
recommend for the organisation.
Both Window and Linux are launching upgraded version of their operating system. Window
from XP to Window 10 has improved a lot. It has more user friendly GUI now, with new
applications and features. Linux is an open source operating system. Coders keep updating it.
Many new features have been added, GUI of Linux is also improved.
This organization is in manufacturing business. Most of the employees or staff will not be
familiar with the commands and complexities of Linux. Window will be a better option as it
give you more user friendly environment. There can be some security issues with Window
but they can be avoided by installing proper softwares (Gopalan and Saxena, 2010).

6. Discuss if the organisation could go for VPS ORD CLOUD- limitations of VPS and
advantages of local servers.
Dedicated servers offer solution for high performance tasks with little overhead. Each server
is for one private user dedicated for that only. Customer gets a physical server with hardware
and software specifications and storage (Gopalan and Venkatachalam, 2007).
VPS clients gets access of one the part of hardware they paid for. Many clients share one host
machine. From users perspective VPS is not different from dedicated server with low range
configurations. Because of virtualization layer, server maintains a range of hardware to serve
multiple clients. It results in lower price and more server options.
Cloud servers are not same as VPS. IN dedicated server and VPS all hardware and host
machines are at one place. But in cloud servers, backend and front end nodes may work at
different locations on different machines. This provides scalability to the functionality.
Resources and data can be shared both by other servers and clients.
On comparing we can say that there is barely any difference in performance of all these
servers. Cloud servers provide performance with superior reliability. Storage and computing
is done at different places, so, it reduces redundancy. Automation can assign new nodes with
least outages which is not provided by VPS or dedicated servers.
Pricing is least for dedicated servers. VPS providers charge on hourly basis same as by cloud
servers. Cloud users pay for what they need or when they need. VPs users has to pay whether
they are using or not as all the resources are reserved for their server.
Cloud servers have fast deployment and easy configuration which gives faster results. Cloud
Servers are suitable for almost all type of work, whereas dedicated is fit for high load and
VPS are for predictable load (Gopalan and Nagarwalla, 2006).

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Conclusion and Recommendation

By analysing various servers and their editions, we can say that server helps to increase
efficiency of the system. Apart from efficiency there are other factors like cost and resources
requirements which affect the choice. Based on above comparisons we suggest that cloud
servers will be of utmost use for the company. Cloud Computing provides a vast
opportunities to swim in. Company is planning to expand in other countries also. So, it will
not be easy to install everything at every location. Cloud computing can provide solution
here. Company offices will be allowed to share hardware, software and database using cloud
computing without incurring any additional cost.

References
Gopalan, M.N. and Nagarwalla, H.E. (2006) Cost-benefit analysis of a n-unit two-server
system with preventive maintenance, Microelectronics Reliability, 26(6), pp. 10771081.
Doi: 10.1016/0026-2714(86)90812-7.
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Gopalan, M.N. and Saxena, A.R. (2010) Stochastic behavior of a 2-unit system with 1-server
subject to delayed maintenance, Microelectronics Reliability, 17(6), pp. 587589. Doi:
10.1016/0026-2714(78)90441-9.

Gopalan, M.N. and Venkatachalam, P. (2007) Two 1-Server n-unit systems with preventive
maintenance and repair, IEEE Transactions on Reliability, R-26(2), pp. 127128. Doi:
10.1109/tr.1977.5220076.

Kocuk, B., Sivrikaya, .E. and Baykal-Grsoy, M. (2013) Maintenance of infinite-server

service systems subjected to random shocks, Computers & Industrial Engineering, 66(1),
pp. 8694. Doi: 10.1016/j.cie.2013.06.010.

Koyanagi, J. and Kawai, H. (2008) An optimal maintenance policy for a server with
decreasing arrival rate and noncancelable customer, Journal of Quality in Maintenance
Engineering, 4(4), pp. 299311. Doi: 10.1108/13552519810234029.

Kreimer, J. and Mehrez, A. (2003) An optimal operation policy for real-time n-server standby systems involving preventive maintenance, European Journal of Operational Research,
69(1), pp. 5054. Doi: 10.1016/0377-2217(93)90089-6.

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Natesan, J. and Jardine, A.K.S. (2004) Stochastic behaviour of a single server n-unit
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Perry, D. and Posner, M.J.M. (2001) A correlated MG1-type queue with randomized server
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Peschansky, A.I. and Kovalenko, A.I. (2015) Semi-Markov model of a single-server queue
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