I'll second the fact of trying to run Vantage directly over the VPN.
We started off that way & the random 7224 errors were terrible!
That was over a internet T1.
Then we installed a terminal server over the internet T1, using Server
2008 & RemoteApp.
This worked well with no errors, but there was still a little too much
lag for our MFG facilities taste.
Then we went to a bonded 3MB MPLS, TS2008 RemoteApp & things were
starting to smooth out nicely.
We still had occasional slow spots when heavily used modules were at
their peak.
At this point I reached out to the users group & Charlie Smith (Hope I
don't get in trouble for putting his name out there, Charlie?) pointed
me in the direction of
NIC teaming on the TS & why it would help. After implementing this on
the TS we finally were at the point we wanted to be.
I guess that it all comes down to what expectations you are going to
have for remote users.
In our case, our MFG facility needed to function as if there were in our
building, so we needed the extra boost.
I don't see this being required for remote order entry types or execs
looking at reports & such.
Ron Flynn
803.407
From: vantage@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf
Of Brian W. Spolarich
Sent: Friday, September 18, 2009 8:03 AM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Multi-Site Connectivity Thoughts
There is considerable discussion on this in the list archives. However
given the rather crappy search engine that Yahoo! Has given us, its
locked in there and difficult to find.
The basic consensus here, and the recommendation of Epicor, is that
RDP/ICA (Remote Desktop/Citrix) is the way to go in terms of delivering
a reliable and acceptable user experience for Vantage in a multi-site
configuration. My own experience is that trying to run the client
directly over the WAN/VPN connection will cause heartache. The OpenEdge
RPC connection that the client uses is very sensitive to packet loss,
and even when other applications work perfectly, you'll get random
errors and connection drops, which will make your users unhappy. I spun
my wheels on this for a while and finally decided I wasn't going to
fight the man on this one. The client *should* work okay in a
direct-over-WAN setup, but Epicor won't talk about tuning options in
OpenEdge.
In terms of connectivity and Citrix/Remote Desktop, you'll be happiest
if you can keep your latency (delay) between the sites as predictable as
possible. We use a VPN over public Internet connections, and although
I've managed to stabilize things, I don't have control over the entire
network path, and occasionally I see periods of high latency which
translate into slow Citrix performance for my remote users. With three
or more sites, if you're not already doing it I would strongly consider
a MPLS-based VPN service, which would guarantee performance between the
sites (I'm guessing that's what you mean below, but just checking).
Of course your database/app server will have to be sufficiently beefy to
handle the additional user load, and you'll need Citrix/Remote Desktop
servers to handle the client itself. I've found that the client isn't a
memory hog in a shared environment, and I could host 40 concurrent
sessions easily on a modestly-configured 32-bit server.
-bws
--
Brian W. Spolarich ~ Manager, Information Services ~ Advanced Photonix /
Picometrix
bspolarich@...
<mailto:bspolarich%40advancedphotonix.com> ~ 734-864-5618 ~
www.advancedphotonix.com
-----Original Message-----
From: vantage@yahoogroups.com <mailto:vantage%40yahoogroups.com>
[mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com <mailto:vantage%40yahoogroups.com> ] On
Behalf Of that_guyy
Sent: Thursday, September 17, 2009 6:30 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com <mailto:vantage%40yahoogroups.com>
Subject: [Vantage] Multi-Site Connectivity Thoughts
Here at BilJax we are about to bring Atlanta, GA online with Vantage and
I was wondering how anyone has handled connectivity to multiple
locations. We have a total of 4 other US locations which will eventually
be brought onto Vantage, each has a full T1 into our company VPN cloud.
Our single Vantage server is at our Archbold, OH office. Suggestions?
Thoughts? Successes? Failures?
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
We started off that way & the random 7224 errors were terrible!
That was over a internet T1.
Then we installed a terminal server over the internet T1, using Server
2008 & RemoteApp.
This worked well with no errors, but there was still a little too much
lag for our MFG facilities taste.
Then we went to a bonded 3MB MPLS, TS2008 RemoteApp & things were
starting to smooth out nicely.
We still had occasional slow spots when heavily used modules were at
their peak.
At this point I reached out to the users group & Charlie Smith (Hope I
don't get in trouble for putting his name out there, Charlie?) pointed
me in the direction of
NIC teaming on the TS & why it would help. After implementing this on
the TS we finally were at the point we wanted to be.
I guess that it all comes down to what expectations you are going to
have for remote users.
In our case, our MFG facility needed to function as if there were in our
building, so we needed the extra boost.
I don't see this being required for remote order entry types or execs
looking at reports & such.
Ron Flynn
803.407
From: vantage@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf
Of Brian W. Spolarich
Sent: Friday, September 18, 2009 8:03 AM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Multi-Site Connectivity Thoughts
There is considerable discussion on this in the list archives. However
given the rather crappy search engine that Yahoo! Has given us, its
locked in there and difficult to find.
The basic consensus here, and the recommendation of Epicor, is that
RDP/ICA (Remote Desktop/Citrix) is the way to go in terms of delivering
a reliable and acceptable user experience for Vantage in a multi-site
configuration. My own experience is that trying to run the client
directly over the WAN/VPN connection will cause heartache. The OpenEdge
RPC connection that the client uses is very sensitive to packet loss,
and even when other applications work perfectly, you'll get random
errors and connection drops, which will make your users unhappy. I spun
my wheels on this for a while and finally decided I wasn't going to
fight the man on this one. The client *should* work okay in a
direct-over-WAN setup, but Epicor won't talk about tuning options in
OpenEdge.
In terms of connectivity and Citrix/Remote Desktop, you'll be happiest
if you can keep your latency (delay) between the sites as predictable as
possible. We use a VPN over public Internet connections, and although
I've managed to stabilize things, I don't have control over the entire
network path, and occasionally I see periods of high latency which
translate into slow Citrix performance for my remote users. With three
or more sites, if you're not already doing it I would strongly consider
a MPLS-based VPN service, which would guarantee performance between the
sites (I'm guessing that's what you mean below, but just checking).
Of course your database/app server will have to be sufficiently beefy to
handle the additional user load, and you'll need Citrix/Remote Desktop
servers to handle the client itself. I've found that the client isn't a
memory hog in a shared environment, and I could host 40 concurrent
sessions easily on a modestly-configured 32-bit server.
-bws
--
Brian W. Spolarich ~ Manager, Information Services ~ Advanced Photonix /
Picometrix
bspolarich@...
<mailto:bspolarich%40advancedphotonix.com> ~ 734-864-5618 ~
www.advancedphotonix.com
-----Original Message-----
From: vantage@yahoogroups.com <mailto:vantage%40yahoogroups.com>
[mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com <mailto:vantage%40yahoogroups.com> ] On
Behalf Of that_guyy
Sent: Thursday, September 17, 2009 6:30 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com <mailto:vantage%40yahoogroups.com>
Subject: [Vantage] Multi-Site Connectivity Thoughts
Here at BilJax we are about to bring Atlanta, GA online with Vantage and
I was wondering how anyone has handled connectivity to multiple
locations. We have a total of 4 other US locations which will eventually
be brought onto Vantage, each has a full T1 into our company VPN cloud.
Our single Vantage server is at our Archbold, OH office. Suggestions?
Thoughts? Successes? Failures?
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]