RE: iSeries Support Question

Hi,

It's impossible to give a direct answer to this question. There's a heck
a lot of factors to consider.

Here are my thoughts:

Who handles user support? Separate, or is this the sysadmins job too?
Who handles the client systems? Are they running a full OS (like Windows
or Desktop Linux), or are they thin Clients?
What other Systems are there? Lotus Notes? Exchange? Windows's Active
Directory? File Sharing? Printer Sharing?
How many users are there? What is the skill level of these users? Do
they read manuals, or do they need a babysitter?

What kind of software are you running? A professionally created and
supported ERP system? Or a 15 year old COBOL-Applications which no one
understands anymore?

What kind of equipment are you running? Decently new hardware, backed by
maintenance contracts? Or 10 year old 4224 connected with flaky cables?

Does your sysadmin have to change toner in printers (or similar tasks)?
Does your sysadmin have to support all kind of other electronical
devices? (Like, Faxes, Telefones, etc.)

Is your sysadmin his own boss? This means he will also need time to do
administrative stuff, like talking about new equipment with his
superiors, etc.

The conclusions:

The smaller the company is, the more stuff the sysadmin has to do. Also,
depending on his skill set, the existing infrastructure, the money
available to him, there are different levels of automation achievable. 

I work for a small System i ISV (we're 25 people), and we sell our own
ERP-Software to customers. Most of them don't have own personnel, and
these that do only seldom have someone knowledgable on the System i.
(Which usually leads to expired HW support contracts on the machine,
unsupported Releases, and CUME Levels from before the dinosaurs).
Internally, we have 5 System i. They don't require much work (beside the
quarterly reboot for CUME), but the same goes for our two windows
servers (Beside the monthly reboot for security fixes).

If you have a well designed infrastructure, running stable, supported
software, with intelligent users, one sysadmin is enough to support 500
people, and the corresponding systems backing them (multiple windows
servers, one system i). He will still have plenty of spare time.

However, if you have a years old, flaky infrastructure, and no one
willing to pay for renewals, with cranky users who don't even think
about reading the manual, you might need 5-10 people for 500 users.





-----Original Message-----
From: midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of
Ashok.Dave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Friday, October 13, 2006 12:29 PM
To: midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: iSeries Support Question

Hello all,
does anyone know of any benchmarking or best practice regarding number
of 
system admin. staff required per system?
Eg. is the ratio 5 systems/sysadmin, or 9 systems per sysadmin, etc.

thanks
Ashok