OneWorld Sizing

bamine

Member
Hi all,

I have some questions about OneWorld architecture and hope u can help me (at less, give me some pointers in this subject please) :

1. Is it reliable to mix in the same machine, OneWorld Ent. Server and other ERPs (like HR Access or even Specific development)

2. Is it good to share the same database server between JDE and other ERPs and use different Ent. Servers for each one?

3. We will use a private WAN to connect some remote sites to our OneWorld server.. Have you any idea about HOW TO SIZE the network (especially what is the average WEB TRANSACTION SIZE in OneWorld)?

I will appreciate any help, suggestions, pointers in this subject
Many thanks in advance
Amine Belouali
 
All ERP applications that I am familiar with assume that they are the only
programs running on a particular machine. Let's look at some different
questions:

Is is _possible_ for two ERP applications to coexist on the same machine?
Yes but you have to do it. Don't expect much help from the vendors since
they do not recommend it and they don't support it. You may be going where
no one has gone before.

Assuming that you decide to install two ERP packages on the same machine,
how much work will it take? That depends on the specific operating system
and hardware configuration and where you decide to be on the spectrum from
"completely isolated" to "completely integrated". For example, if you use
JDE for sales order entry and Peoplesoft for payroll/HR and you install them
on an AS/400 using LPARs, I would expect very little interaction except the
sizing. For the sizing, I would simple add together the vendor
recommendations - plus your own adjustments. On the other hand, if you
purchase JDE for GL and Peoplesoft for Payroll/HR and one of the CRM
packages for sales and you want to run them as a tightly integrated package
on the same Unix system, I would expect a lot of experimentation and
debugging before you can make it work and upgrades will be unpleasant.

Now that you have chosen to embark on this path, how much risk is there?
That depends on

a. deadlines - how close are they, how firm are they

b. resources - if you hit a readblock, do you have the people and the money
to overcome it or do you have to redesign or stretch the deadline

c. requirements - if only a very high degree of integration will work, you
have to keep at it until you can make that work. That means that
development plans and budgets are subject to how it actually works and that
is hard to know until you get into the project.

How can you reduce your risks?

Initially, use low-tech interfaces (batch feeds) instead of high-tech ones
(such as calling transaction applications between the products).

Expect to be smarter in a year or two and to redesign at that time.

If you "aim high", have acceptable less-ambitious targets that can be used
as fallbacks - two or three is good, you may need more if the project is
long and involved.

Be certain that your corporate management supports your risky venture. It
is ugly if management thinks that your project is a walk in the park then,
when a problem arises, you have to tell them that you had only a 50 percent
success expectation in the first place. That will get someone fired and
losing your development manager in the middle of the project is usually not
helpful.

Have lots of money for hardware and network. If all else fails, you can
split the apps and run them on their own servers.

If you are relying on specific resources (for example, Joe at your favorite
consulting company) make sure that you have Joe well and truly tied in. If
the consulting company gets into a budget crunch and decides that Joe is too
expensive, you might lose your resource. This gets especially ugly if you
have an agreement with the consulting company that you can't hire Joe.

Better a small success than a big failure.

Richard Jackson
(speaking only for myself)

-----Original Message-
 
Re: RE: OneWorld Sizing

Thanks Richard for the effort you made to help me,

I appreciate your advises in project management even it wasn't the subject of my email..

Otherwise i still need help in the questions i asked, especially how to size network in OneWorld Web Solution (what is the AVERAGE WEB TRANSACTION SIZE in OneWorld?)

Many thanks in advance for any help
Amine
 
Re: RE: OneWorld Sizing

The network bandwidth really depends on the number of transactions that occur given a certain amount of time - and the size of the transactions.

As an example - a Sales Order differs between customers - some customers have sales orders with hundreds of lines - others have sales orders on the magnitude of only a few lines. Each line is a transaction to me - the majority of Sales Order Processing occurs with each individual line rather than the Beginning of the Document or the End of the Document (though this is where the commits occur usually).

In a Citrix environment, it really doesn't matter how many or how little sales orders one is plugging into the system. The more "active" users moving their mouse around and touching the keyboard will generate more network traffic than those who are not as active - but the two types of user normally use approximately the same amount of bandwidth. Streaming technologies such as Citrix are more Latent dependant than Transactional technologies such as the web.

The JD Edwards HTML client - when it is running 100% HTML - is pretty efficient. It does however work slightly different from the Windows client in that it works in a Page Mode - ie, the user types in all of the transactions in one web page and submits the whole page at once. Any errors would then be reported back. It is not, therefore, as interactive as the Windows client (I may be wrong about this with certain new forms under Xe - I await the flaming over this one....)

However - the transactions between client and server (browser and web server) are relatively light - especially on the number of Turns. Each sales order is purely a page of HTML being transferred backwards and forwards - hence bandwidth is not necessarily a problem. It should not be, therefore, at the top of your mind when sizing up the ERP application - make sure you have "enough" bandwidth that web-surfing ceases to become an issue.

Remember that the web solution requires that the web server is placed as close to the Enterprise Server as possible - I promise you that you do not want to see JDBC commands reaching over any latent network, it'll kill performance.

I have seen the OneWorld HTML client work on a CDPD connection with a handheld. It seems to work relatively well - given the fact that CDPD provides a maximum bandwidth of 19200 baud and the latency is usually >1 second. Citrix works over this connection type - but it is a little painful (>1 second between clicks and screen updates) - any other client type would never work correctly.

Rule of thumb. You need approximately 5K of concurrent bandwidth per user for Citrix with a minimum of 28K. I'd suggest that for each CONCURRENT web user size the network using about half. Therefore if 500 users are hitting your OneWorld Web Server CONCURRENTLY - I'd size up close to a T1.

None of the above information, by the way, is a reflection of any JD Edwards Sizing - and is only a suggestion and an opinion. Please treat this information accordingly.

Jon Steel
erpSOURCING LLC
http://www.erpsourcing.com


ERP Sourcing
http://www.erpsourcing.com
[email protected]
 
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