Metia CEP Adopt Office 365 for Education from the Aspects ...



0952500Microsoft Office 365 for educationCustomer Solution Case StudyEnabling Downtime-Free email systems with Cloud VirtualizationOverviewCustomer: Osaka Ohtani UniversityWeb site : osaka-ohtani.ac.jpCountry or Region: JapanIndustry: EducationPartner: Internet Initiative Japan,Nippon COMSYSCustomer ProfileOsaka Ohtani University was established based on the teaching of Mahayana Buddhism. In 2009 the University celebrated its 100th anniversary. About 4,000 of students and faculty members conduct study and research activities every day.Business SituationThe old email systems were running on Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 machines which were placed within the university. There were some problems in operation and management.SolutionThe University selected Office 365 for education because of the following two aspects: The first is BCP. The second is reduction in costs and management workload.BenefitsConstructing a system which never goes down even when internal systems and/or networks are stoppedReducing costs and workload for email system management and anti-spam Improving operability and work environment for end users “Above all, from the aspect of planning for emergencies including disasters, we think we have achieved our original goal.”Nobuki Ito, Information Technology Officer, Information Education Centre, Osaka Ohtani University.Osaka Ohtani University & Osaka Ohtani College is the core of Ohtani Gakuen, which is a private education institution with over 100 years of history. Among the liberal arts universities in Japan, it started rather early to work on making use of information technologies for education. The university established the faculty of pharmacy in 2006. Since setting up a computer-equipped classroom in 1989, the university has replaced its IT infrastructures such as hardware and networks every four to five years so that the latest technologies are always introduced to help keeping a high education quality level.In 2012, the university decided to introduce the cloud technology by adopting Office 365 for education and virtualizing Active Directory, Osaka Ohtani University & Osaka Ohtani College successfully established "downtime-free email systems."SituationThe spirit foundation of Osaka Ohtani University & Osaka Ohtani College (Ohtani University) is "Houon Kansha," which is a teaching of Mahayana Buddhism meaning "repaying obligations and having a sense of gratitude." 5511801937385"When we were having discussions about a new email system, The Great East Japan Earthquake happened."Masashi Nakamura, Director of Information Education Centre and Associate Professor, Department of Human and Social Sciences, Osaka Ohtani University 00"When we were having discussions about a new email system, The Great East Japan Earthquake happened."Masashi Nakamura, Director of Information Education Centre and Associate Professor, Department of Human and Social Sciences, Osaka Ohtani University Now, Ohtani University has about 4,000 students and faculty members in total. The university started to work on IT education earlier than other liberal arts universities. Masashi Nakamura, Director of Information Education Centre and Associate Professor, Department of Human and Social Sciences, explains, "In 1989, we set up a computer-equipped classroom. The current year, we've decided to conduct a major replacement as made the drastic change of our email systems." The old email systems were running on Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 machines which were placed within the university. However, according to Shinya Kishigami, Information Technology Officer, Information Education Centre, Osaka Ohtani University, there were some problems in operation and management. "We had to attempt to restore by ourselves when the system failure occurred. For email filtering, we used anti-spam functions of Exchange Server 2003 together with a third-party tool. However, necessary emails were sometimes blocked but loosening of filtering rules increased spam emails, and such adjustment was our problem." "When we were having discussions about new email systems, The Great East Japan Earthquake happened. As a university supporting campus lives of students, we really felt that it is our responsibility for maintaining the operation of email systems. Therefore, the cloud technology emerged as an option," says Nakamura.Ohtani University started the IT infrastructure replacement project in summer of 2011. Respective technology requirements such as those for units of computer-equipped classrooms, the network, and the email systems were presented to vendors, and proposals from some vendors were examined. As a result, the proposal from Internet Initiative Japan (IIJ) was adopted for the network and the email systems. Nobuhiro Naka, Technical Manager, Professional Services Section 1, Kansai Branch Engineering Department, International Initiative Japan, Inc. explains the points of the proposal. "We understood that Ohtani University was focusing an attention on the cloud technology partly because considering consequences of The Great East Japan Earthquake. But, not just proposals based on the cloud technology, we offered three types of proposal so that the client could select the method which had the greatest benefit. Specifically, we proposed migration to the latest on-premise Exchange Server, Google Apps, and cloud-based Office 365 for education. “Among these three options, Google Apps was first examined. Nakamura explained the process. "We've learned from past experiences that unexpectedly many faculty members don't welcome changes in emails, we had to keep unchanged the interface from the existing email systems as far as possible. Otherwise Google 5511801937385"When we were having discussions about a new email system, The Great East Japan Earthquake happened."Masashi Nakamura, Director of Information Education Centre and Associate Professor, Department of Human and Social Sciences, Osaka Ohtani University 00"When we were having discussions about a new email system, The Great East Japan Earthquake happened."Masashi Nakamura, Director of Information Education Centre and Associate Professor, Department of Human and Social Sciences, Osaka Ohtani University Apps's specifications such as service contents or the interface were changeable, so we felt anxiety for using it. Since we usually replace IT infrastructures every four to five years, major changes in the operating environment are not preferable. For this point, we gave up selecting Google Apps. Also, from our view point of compliance, there were concerns about Google's privacy policies." Next, the university compared on-premise Exchange Server and cloud-based Office 365 for education. According to Nakamura, Office 365 for education was selected from the following two aspects:"The first is BCP. If servers are located within the campus and goes down due to disasters or something, emails become unavailable. We wanted to avoid such a problem from happening. The second is reduction in costs and management workload. In our case, the number of users is 4,000 and it is on the border line whether the scale merit of owing servers can be provided or not. Therefore, it would be better to outsource management so that we could gain more benefits in total. That was our conclusion." SolutionAt the end of 2011, Ohtani University decided to adopt Office 365 for education, and system structure was started. As for the structuring, the authentication platform for Active Directory and Active Directory Federation Service (ADFS 2.0) was placed also on the IIJ's cloud platform, "IIJ GIO." Kishigami explains the reason."Previously, the authentication platform was placed only within the campus and it was used for our scho5511801937385"We are going to consider introduction of Microsoft SharePoint Online and Microsoft Lync Online, as well as PaaS hosting of internal systems from the aspect of BCP."Masashi Nakamura, Director of Information Education Centre and Associate Professor, Department of Human and Social Sciences, Osaka Ohtani University 00"We are going to consider introduction of Microsoft SharePoint Online and Microsoft Lync Online, as well as PaaS hosting of internal systems from the aspect of BCP."Masashi Nakamura, Director of Information Education Centre and Associate Professor, Department of Human and Social Sciences, Osaka Ohtani University ol business system, e-learning system, and email system. But, for providing a "downtime-free email system," it was necessary to place Active Directory and ADFS 2.0 on cloud so that they could work with on-premise Active Directory." For such PaaS hosting of the authentication platform, having faith in IIJ GIO, a cloud platform of IIJ, was the key. Yasuaki Ogawa, Sales Section IV, Kansai Sales Department, Internet Initiative Japan says, "Our company, IIJ, already had know-how and credibility of data center operation. We made a proposal to use IIJ GIO, which is provided based on our proven infrastructure, and Ohtani University seemed to find it interesting as the cloud platform for Active Directory." As a result, Ohtani University, IIJ, and Microsoft set up the structure in which an Active Directory server is placed on IIJ GIO and synchronizes with the on-premise master Active Directory server. In the process of installation of the new email systems, migration from the old systems was also conducted. Masaaki Yamanaka, System Solution Section, Solution Department, IT Business Division, Nippon COMSYS Corporation, who worked together with IIJ for the migration, says, "For the migration from Exchange Server 2003 to Office 365 for education, we used the tool which was provided by Microsoft. While contacting Microsoft Support and obtaining advises on how to use the tool and its advanced functions, we conducted the process. In its early stages, we were troubled to connect to the migration source, Exchange Server 2003, due to the configuration of the existing environment. However, we could solve the problem by changing the connection route, and gradually completed the migration, taking about one week per faculty on schedule." At the end of March 2012, the email migration was completed successfully. The new email systems that were based on Office 365 for education started its operation from April, the beginning of a new school year.BenefitsThe primary focus of this project was to provide "downtime-free email systems". In terms of that, the result was satisfactory, according to Nobuki Ito, Information Technology Officer, Information Education Centre, Osaka Ohtani University. "After installation of the new email systems, we actually stopped our network and emails were available without any problems. Previously, at the time of maintenance and others, we had to stop the email systems and therefore it was necessary to pay utmost attention to the time and day of system shutdown, the term of downtime, and notification to users. Now, such works are considerably reduced. Above all, from the aspect of planning for emergencies including disasters, we think we have achieved our original goal." In addition, filtering of spam emails, which was an issue of the previous system, can be performed successfully in the new systems. This is achieved just by standard functions; it is not necessary to install any anti-spam tool on the systems. In terms of effect which with PaaS hosting of the email systems produced for end users, Nakamura says, "After the PaaS hosting, there is no major change in how end users make use of the email systems. Of course, it is a positive aspect. Since our original plan was not to change usability for end users as far as possible, it has been meaningful that we could migrate to the new systems without making users conscious of the PaaS hosting."Also, Shotaro Morimoto, Professor, Laboratory of Molecular Chemistry, Faculty of Pharmacy and Sub-director, Information Education Centre, Osaka Ohtani University says, "As for the faculty of pharmacy, it seemed that, previously, not so many students used the email systems of the university. However, since smartphones are rapidly popular and the newly introduced email systems can be used when the internal systems down, the number of student users undoubtedly increase. In fact, emails are necessary for their job hunting and practical training at hospitals, pharmacies, and others. I think the new systems will be fairly helpful for students as well.”Although the email systems of Ohtani University made progress to the downtime-free systems, the structure of other internal systems is not largely changed from the previous one. Specifically, the school business system, which manages data such as student information and syllabi, and the e-learning systems are still authenticated by the on-premise Active Directory, and that means the perfect downtime-free systems are not yet provided as a whole. Also, single sign-on is not available systems other than the email systems. Nakamura expresses the outlook that these issues will be the targets of improvement at the next time of replacement. "The school business system is used both by faculty members and students and plays a role like a portal system. If it is possible to use all of the systems including the email systems by signing in just to the school business system, usability will be greatly improved. This is our future task. Also, in the future, we are going to consider introduction of Microsoft SharePoint Online and Microsoft Lync Online, as well as PaaS hosting of internal systems from the aspect of BCP." For universities which are considering PaaS hosting of internal systems including email systems, the combination of Office 365 for education and Active Directory with ADFS 2.0, which was hosted on IIJ data centers within the country, can serve as a helpful reference in many ways.28460708110220Product Solution ItemsMicrosoft Office 365 for educationMicrosoft Exchange OnlineWindows Server 2008 R2Active Directory Active Directory Federation Service 2.0PartnersInternet Initiative JapanNippon COMSYS00Product Solution ItemsMicrosoft Office 365 for educationMicrosoft Exchange OnlineWindows Server 2008 R2Active Directory Active Directory Federation Service 2.0PartnersInternet Initiative JapanNippon COMSYS5454657903210This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.Document published December 201200This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.Document published December 20125403852056765For More InformationFor more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers in the United States and Canada who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:For more information about Microsoft Office 365, go to:For more information about The Osaka Ohtani University, call Phone: Phone: 0721 24 0381 / +81 721 24 0381 or visit the website at: osaka-ohtani.ac.jpFor more information about the Internet Initiative Japan, visit the website at: iij.ad.jpFor more information about the Nippon COMSYS, visit the website at: sys.co.jp00For More InformationFor more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers in the United States and Canada who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:For more information about Microsoft Office 365, go to:For more information about The Osaka Ohtani University, call Phone: Phone: 0721 24 0381 / +81 721 24 0381 or visit the website at: osaka-ohtani.ac.jpFor more information about the Internet Initiative Japan, visit the website at: iij.ad.jpFor more information about the Nippon COMSYS, visit the website at: sys.co.jpMicrosoft Office 365Microsoft Office 365 brings together cloud versions of our most trusted communications and collaboration products—Microsoft SharePoint Online, Exchange Online, and Lync Online—with the latest version of our Office desktop suite and companion web applications for businesses of all sizes. Office 365 helps save time and money, and it frees up valued resources. Simple to use and easy to administer, it is financially backed by a service level agreement guaranteeing 99 percent reliability. Office 365 features robust security, IT-level phone support, geo-redundancy, disaster recovery, and the business-class privacy controls and standards that you expect from a world-class service provider. ................
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