Microsoft BackOffice
Microsoft BackOffice can make your business run more quickly, more efficiently and more cost effectively. How? Dermot Hogan explains all
Easy business solutions
At first, thereís just you and your PC. Then your business
grows ñ youíve hired a couple of people ñ
and before you know it the place is filled with your staff and
their PCs. If youíre not careful, this ad-hoc collection
of hardware and software could cause problems. Orders misplaced,
vital files accidentally deleted and so on. Itís only a
matter of time before someone trips over a ëtemporaryí
cable to bring the whole operation to a grinding halt. Time to
get organised!
This is where Microsoft® BackOffice can help. Itís
the ëorganisationalí counterpart to Microsoft®
Office and Microsoft® Windows® 95. BackOffice can help
to structure the way you use Word, Excel and other applications.
Itís the easy-to-use foundation of a solid computing strategy
that can grow as your business does.
At the heart of BackOffice is Windows NT Server 3.51. This
is the BackOffice equivalent of Windows 95. Whereas Windows 95
is aimed at running applications such as Microsoft Excel, Word,
Schedule+ and PowerPoint, Windows NT is designed to run ëmission
criticalí applications ñ things that just have to
work.
Client-server computing
Windows NT can function either as a desktop operating system or,
as in BackOffice, as a server. A server, as its name suggests,
provides ëservicesí to desktop machines. One of the
most important services that Windows NT offers is ëfile servingí.
This means that Windows NT acts as a central storehouse of files
and data. These can be shared among the desktop ëclientí
PCs. This is called client-server computing and it can help your
business run faster, more smoothly and more cost effectively.
Client-server computing merges the ease of use of PCs with the
power and manageability of mainframes.
Keeping it safe
Other functions of Windows NT that are vital to your business
are backup and confidentiality. Windows NT can copy important
files to a tape unit for backup and storage purposes. This can
be done automatically at a convenient time.
Confidentiality can be ensured by the
security features of Windows NT. These cover
a wide range of choices from light security ñ
making sure the office junior canít accidentally delete
your entire customer database, for example ñ to keeping
the companyís profit and loss figures confidential.
Getting wired
You can set up a BackOffice server so that
it communicates with remote BackOffice servers in your other offices
or manufacturing plants. Production data can be retrieved from
remote sites. Similarly, the next dayís sales orders can
be transferred to them at virtually any time.
Once you have all your PCs connected together, then you can use
email. With email, you can send messages to colleagues, circulate
memos and minutes of meetings, and so on. Part of BackOffice is
Microsoft Mail Server 3.5. Using this, you can set up and manage
individual and company wide ëmailboxesí.
Making sure that your data is safe is only one of the services
that Windows NT offers.
An all weather database
For example, it is possible to corrupt a shared Access database
if one of the PCs using it fails. With SQL Server, these problems
are handled in a routine way. If the worst does
happen, and the BackOffice Windows NT
server fails at a key point ñ say a power failure when
the production database is being updated ñ then SQL Server
will start to recover when the power is restored. Moreover, it
can automatically recover the database to the point where the
system is functioning correctly again.
SQL Server also has diagnostic tools to help track down problems.
These tools may not seem very important when everything is running
smoothly. But, when Sodís Law strikes and you have to get
the sales figures out, then it can be a different story!
Of the three database applications that Microsoft produces ñ
Access, FoxPro and SQL Server ñ it is the third that is
most suited to large scale, mission critical usage. SQL Server
6.0 is designed to be used from many PCs at once. It takes in
its stride problems arising from a number of users sharing data.
On a larger scale
With this, you can keep track of what computers are attached to
the network, their configuration and what software they have running
on them. You can also use SMS, as British Telecom does, to distribute
software to PCs. Running around with some floppy disks updating
thousands of PCs can be an expensive business. In fact, BT estimates
that it has saved several million pounds annually in this way.
The final part of BackOffice is the SNA Server 2.11. With this
you can connect to IBMís System Network Architecture (SNA).
For example, you might run your companyís payroll and accounts
on an IBM mainframe or AS400 minicomputer, but your accountants
want to work on Excel spreadsheets with data extracted from the
mainframeís database. The SNA Server makes this possible
by combining the familiar user interface of desktop PCs with the
flexibility of Large Area Network (LAN) systems.
When your business grows even larger and contains a PC network
that is split over several sites, a whole new set of problems
can occur when youíre trying to keep control of the network.
BackOffice has a monitoring and management toolset, Microsoft®
Systems Management Server (SMS) 1.1 to assist you with large systems.
Back in the office again
Microsoft BackOffice is the heavy duty partner to Windows 95 and
Office 95. Itís simple to set up and use and has the ability
to grow as your company and its requirements grow. BackOffice
is a necessity for people who take their PC
networks seriously.
BackOffice in bits ñ whatís involved
Microsoft BackOffice 1.5 has five components: Windows NT Server
3.51, SQL Server 6.0, System Management Services 1.1, Mail 3.5
and SNA Server 2.11.
Windows NT Server 3.51: this is the heart of BackOffice. Windows
NT Server provides file and security services to client PCs running
Windows NT Workstation, Windows 95, Windows for Workgroups and
Windows 3.1.
SQL Server 6.0: this is Microsoftís powerful
relational database. You use industry standard SQL (Structured Query Language) statements
to store and retrieve data from SQL Server
databases. Both the Visual Basic programming
language and Excel can work with this data,
building, for example, complex management information reports.
Mail 3.5: use this to enable your company to send electronic mail.
SMS 1.1: for managing and controlling large networks. With this,
you can distribute software to PCs on your network and keep track
of network loads and errors.
SNA Server 2.11: for getting information from IBM mainframes.
You can download information from the corporate or external mainframe
for use in Excel spreadsheets.
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You can keep your data safe on a central BackOffice server. It
can be backed up onto tape automatically. But you can go further.
Windows NT Server allows you to keep a ëmirrorí, or
duplicate, of a disk in case of mechanical failure. Here you can
see that disk drive ëDí on device number 1 has been
mirrored onto some spare space on device number 0.
SQL Server is a full featured relational database with links into
both Excel and Word. There is also a separate SQL query facility.
With this you can set and control various aspects of the database
and find out how a particular query is being performed.
System Management Services (SMS) doesnít just track and distribute programs, it also comes with a whole range of diagnostic programs. With the network monitor you can see how much traffic is passing through your section of the network.