What is the background of the birth of the intelligent wiring system? What stage of development is currently reaching? How big is the space? The intelligent cabling system that has just received attention from users, it is necessary to introduce these issues.
"Intelligent wiring systems began to appear in the mid-1980s. The main reason for their emergence is that network administrators are very troubled to manually record wiring link information, and they also hope to monitor the wiring system in real time. In addition, jump wiring changes occurred during the use of the wiring system due to the increase and movement of users, which often caused many errors in manual recording wiring system information, resulting in many management problems. In this context, an intelligent wiring system with real-time management of jump connections of distribution frames came into being." Shen Linong, marketing manager of Simon Asia Pacific, introduced the birth of the intelligent wiring system.
Obviously, the intelligent wiring system was born to replace the inconvenience and prone to errors in manual management, and at the same time to facilitate changes in jumper lines. In fact, although it was born early, its real development is still in recent years, and it is even more recent that it has begun to be accepted by users. Ye Chunhui, manager of Greater China, Molex Enterprise Cabling Networks Department, said, "Real-time cabling systems can simplify the movement, addition and modification (MAC) process by using computer-generated work orders. The progress of these work orders can be monitored off-site through network ports supported by the intelligent cabling system in a network connection or communication. Network administrators can determine the order in which movement, addition and modification are performed, because this is closely related to the physical layout of active and passive devices. Technicians can obtain real-time feedback to accurately understand the performance of plug-in work, verify that all connections are correct and whether the functions are normal."
It can be seen that it can solve application problems so that the intelligent wiring system can develop step by step, and has huge development potential. As Shen Linong said, the development of intelligent cabling systems has gone through the following stages: first, it is only for the management system of the distribution frame to facilitate jump connections and document recording; second, it is to manage the entire wiring link. At this time, the management software can manage each link from the network device port and the workspace port; currently, the intelligent cabling system with the management of network assets has been launched, and the system can include network equipment and workspace terminal equipment connected to the wiring system into its management scope. The direction of future development will be to fully improve asset management functions and enable intelligent cabling systems to become an important part of the entire network asset management.
Unique value and exclusive network management software
What value can intelligent cabling systems bring to users? Do you still need it with network management software?
Intelligent cabling systems are the latest developments in structured cabling documents and management systems, and their value is unique. Because traditional cabling management mainly includes written records, spreadsheets or database management software, one of the main disadvantages of these methods is that the management personnel have a large workload, and all data updates require manual operations by the management personnel. In many cases, because network administrators fail to update data in time, the data in the management database is invalid, so managers need to spend a lot of time and energy to update records, which brings difficulties to work. But these methods cannot view network connection status in real time. Similarly, although Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) can view network traffic in real time, only through an intelligent cabling system (because this is physical layer management) can network administrators fully view the complete physical interconnection between communications, and provide them in real time. In other words, since the wiring system is at the bottom of the information system (physical layer) and the wiring equipment does not have intelligent communication functions, traditional network management software cannot directly manage equipment at this level. This is the fundamental reason why the intelligent wiring system distinguishes network management software and its value lies.
"Timely and automated physical layer management is a rapidly growing market. Users' awareness of the need for integrated network management solutions is increasing. Intelligent cabling systems can reduce the pressure on management of changing networks and minimize network interruption time. This means that network administrators have more network connection time and less wiring troubles. Using network management application integration and physical layer management capabilities on the SNMP platform provides network administrators with a broader perspective and control over the management of the entire network." Xu Xianghong, technical director of CommScope, introduced the value brought to users by intelligent cabling systems.
Indeed, as enterprise wiring facilities become more and more complex, the management of wiring systems has become time-consuming and labor-intensive. Intelligent wiring systems can reduce interruption time, realize intelligent maintenance, and avoid manual documentation, allowing network administrators to get rid of time-consuming and prone to human errors, greatly saving the management costs of information technology infrastructure. This is the greatest value of intelligent cabling systems.
Ye Chunhui also talked about the "added value" of intelligent wiring systems from another perspective, which is both realistic and interesting. "Because the camera is integrated, users don't have to worry about anyone who dares to make illegal moves, adds, and changes. Many of the required alarms can be achieved by adding optional event recognition. The system can also send detailed information about any illegal changes via E-mail. And the real-time cabling system can help prevent theft, which can take photos of people robbing in communications and workspaces."
Composition of both soft and hard functions are becoming increasingly rich
Is the intelligent cabling system software or hardware? What is composed of? Are there enough features?
Although there are great differences between the intelligent wiring systems of each manufacturer, it is a common feature composed of hardware and software. The hardware monitors the connection between wiring, and the software records the documents of all devices in the entire network.
"In order to realize intelligent management of wiring systems at the physical layer, there must be a mechanism that can realize real-time detection of physical layer connections. Each manufacturer uses different methods when implementing data detection, but its basic principles are very simple. They all use the principle of circuit switches. When the wiring link is connected, the detection switch is cut off when the wiring link is disconnected. The intelligent wiring system determines the status of the port connection by detecting the switch status." Cai Li, product marketing director of TIKE Electronics Amp Wiring System Department, briefly and intuitively introduced the working principle of the intelligent wiring system.
Generally speaking, the hardware part consists of analyzers, patch frames, jumpers, connecting cables, patch frame port induction strips, etc.; the software part is mainly proprietary software packages. Through the tight integration of hardware and software and working together, intelligent management of the cabling system is achieved.
The following is a detailed description of Tyco Electronics Amp's intelligent wiring system as an example. The system is still based on the traditional AMP Netconnect 110 modular cabling system.
Users can use any manufacturer's network products. The difference is that the system has added a metal sensing pad on each RJ-45 port of the patch frame, and a metal needle is added outside the jumper. This metal needle is in contact with the sensing pad of the 110 patch frame. The 110 patch frame is connected to the network analyzer through I/O cable. The network analyzer and iTRACS software can monitor the connection status between patch panels and between network equipment and patch panels in real time and dynamically. The combination of AMPTRAC hardware and iTRACS software system makes up for the lack of physical layer links in the previous integrated network management system. It is a revolutionary method of network control and archive management. This unified infrastructure management system can automatically generate a complete physical topology diagram of the network system in the telecommunications room or in the data center. Through real-time physical layer automatic management, it provides a real-time and complete network fault diagnosis and disaster recovery document information, and uninterrupted real-time recording of the addition, movement and deletion of network cabling systems.
It should be noted that not all intelligent wiring systems have external sensing devices or "metal pins". The SYSTIMAX iPatch system is an example and can accept standard RJ-45 and RJ-11 jumpers.
Intelligent management of the cabling system mainly involves functions such as information recording and update, error recognition, configuration changes, and error alarms. Specifically, automatic detection and discovery of wiring ports, automatic detection of connections between ports, understanding the status of the port, recording connection events of jumpers, real-time management of remote wiring systems, understanding whether the connection of jumpers is authorized, responding to trigger events, controlling the order of completion of work, understanding the network device ports connected to the wiring system, recording all jumpers changes and forming log files, and interoperating with the network management system have become the main functions of intelligent wiring systems.
Big users’ choices There is a way to avoid blind selection
Which specific user is suitable for using intelligent wiring systems? Is it necessary for small and medium-sized users to adopt intelligent cabling systems? What issues do users need to pay attention to when choosing an intelligent cabling system?
Small companies with a few people are easy to manage, and companies with scale often become the biggest problem. The same is true for wiring systems. The wiring system with only 180 nodes uses intelligent wiring systems, which are obviously a bit overkill. Generally speaking, intelligent cabling systems are suitable for networks with about 500 horizontal connections. If the number of connections is less than 500, it can usually be easily managed using traditional methods. "There are many nodes, and often after several manual jumpers, the database is easily forgotten to change. For the financial industry that uses IT investment as production machines, the smart wiring system should be used most." Li Qizhi, business director of the Asia-Pacific region of Tyco Electronics Amp Cabling Systems Department, said.
"At present, intelligent cabling systems have received the attention of users. We are talking about several major projects in this regard, and the results will be achieved soon. In fact, intelligent cabling systems have already had many cases in other countries, such as in India, and there are relatively few applications in China, but 2005 will be the beginning of many users' application of intelligent cabling systems." Li Qizhi views the application of intelligent cabling systems in this way.
In fact, the more you know the wiring itself, the greater the possibility of choosing an intelligent wiring system. As mentioned in the article, the project's project, CITIC Beijing Guoan Electric Corporation, the owner of the project, is itself a very large wiring system integrator. It has done many large projects and has a much better understanding of wiring than ordinary users. It is this experience that has made me first use an intelligent wiring system.
Obviously, large users are ideal buyers of intelligent cabling systems, but things are not absolute. The value of data on any scale of network may make the intelligent management of cabling systems worth the money. Ye Chunhui gave us an example to illustrate this truth. The financial industry is quite special. For example, in the trading room, any network interruption will cause great losses. If you examine some of the advantages of intelligent cabling systems, you can see that this system can be effectively adopted in many cases because it can reduce system interruptions caused by wiring changes. Therefore, the biggest determinant is the end user's awareness of the value of data or the loss caused by the lack of data when the system is interrupted.
Shen Linong also expressed the same view, "It is suitable for large users of projects above 1,000 points. The larger the project, the more difficult the management work is to be done, and the more intelligent wiring systems are needed. Small and medium-sized users also need them in key departments and key areas."
So, what issues should be paid attention to for users who want to adopt intelligent wiring systems?
One of the most important factors is compliance with the standards. The use of standards board-approved connectors can facilitate standards-based testing. It should be noted that some "systems" seem to be more like a collection of various spare parts, using one manufacturer's connector in the communications and another manufacturer's connector in the workspace. When a problem occurs, where is the dividing point? Common sense tells us that the system should be selected from a manufacturer. Of course, software is also required to be included in the system, and the system manufacturer must be able to support the entire product collection, not just traditional connections.
In addition to the standards, the number of users' MACs or less, whether the intelligent wiring system has real-time functions, whether the jumping and docking are suitable, whether there is a warranty and corresponding training are also the objects that users need to examine.
"Some intelligent wiring systems can be integrated with network management software, such as HP OpenView, and support multiple network types, which can also be applicable to existing systems. This is crucial because it can ensure that the connection status of the entire enterprise network can be viewed and the return on investment can be indirectly shortened." Cai Li gave users such a reminder from another perspective. Indeed, when users choose intelligent wiring systems, it is important to consider how to integrate with network management software, so that the entire network system can be managed more uniformly and the value it will be exerted.
The installation is not complicated
The installation of the wiring system is a concern for users, so what about the installation of the intelligent wiring system? In fact, the physical installation of an intelligent cabling system is not more complicated than that of a standard structured cabling system. It usually only has certain electronic devices, and the process is not very troublesome. The user just needs to put these electronic devices into the rack and connect them to the sensor cable from the horizontal distribution frame and the hub port sensor. The real trick to installing an intelligent cabling system is configuration. These systems rely on a database to provide connection information, and if set up improperly, the information results may be incorrect or misleading. Some databases are significantly easier to run, but they require a lot of configuration. Compared with traditional wiring, intelligent wiring systems put different quality requirements for installers. This should also become an important factor for users to examine integrators (installers).
The editor thought: I was confused?
It always takes some time to make a decision when choosing new technologies and new products. At this stage, I feel confused. The same is true for intelligent cabling systems. What can they bring to users? Is the return on investment satisfactory? Is it easy to use? These problems made the user confused for a while. The reporter believes that if the following two questions are understood, a decision will be made.
On the one hand, the cost of 50% to 100% of the extra expenditure is still not worth it (it should be noted here that the proportion of the cost of intelligent cabling systems in different regions is different in the total cost of wiring. Since the price of copper cable in China is cheap, the proportion is high, and in the United States, this number should be about 20%.
Generally speaking, if a user chooses an intelligent wiring system, the cost needs to be spent 50% to 100%. How to determine whether this part of the cost is worth it or not? It should be said that there is no standard answer, and it depends on the specific situation of the user. The most important thing is that it depends on the more or less of the future movement, addition and modification (MAC) in the user's wiring system. If there is no need to change, the value of the intelligent wiring system cannot be exerted. The key is, who knows the future situation, especially for wiring systems that need to be run for 10 years or even longer.
What is certain is that for projects with long service hours, the difficulty and cost of manual management will naturally increase. On the one hand, the administrators responsible for the project may have already made a high demand in a few years; on the other hand, the cost of personnel is increasing, and at the same time, the degree of user dependence on informatization is also increasing, and the loss per unit time caused by network interruptions will increase. If these facts still cannot make the user determined to pay 50% to 100% more fees, there may be doubts that will be discussed below.
On the other hand, is it feasible to upgrade to an intelligent cabling system in the future? Technically speaking, upgrading is feasible, and there is no doubt about it. However, users need to add software and some hardware and replace jumpers, which means it is very difficult and the construction cycle is very long. Not to mention increasing investment, changing jumper means network interruption. Does user's business allow it?
In fact, every era has its own products. Now, when buying a 486 computer, it may not be found. Even if it is found, most users will not buy it because the corresponding application software can no longer run on such machines. The same is true for the development of cabling systems. Now it has developed to the edge of the era of intelligent management systems, which is destined to be widely popular and users do not choose. Once the "fried noodles" cable appears in three years, it will be in a mess forever and completely "cut and tidy up".