TRANSITIONING A MOBILE FIELD
FORCE TO MOBILINK/AFARIA
REMOTELY
KURT TRUSHENSKI & BRAD COOMES
ECOLAB IT
WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 14, 2011
CORPORATE OVERVIEW
• Company
With more than $6 billion in global sales, Ecolab is the global
leader in cleaning, sanitizing, food safety and infection control
products and services.
• Headquarters
St. Paul, Minnesota, USA
• Employees
More than 26,000 associates worldwide
• Global Reach
Ecolab serves customers in more than 160 countries across
North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, the Middle
East and Africa.
2 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
APPLICATION OVERVIEW
ESM 360° Advisor
• User Base - 3500+ Field associates across the US and Canada
• Purpose
– Capturing service call details
– Placing orders
– Tracking sales and budgets
– Prospecting
• Data
– 500+ tables synchronized to Windows XP Tablet PCs
– Average Client DB size ~ 50 Mb
– Daily Consolidated transaction volume ~ 7 Gb
3 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
APPLICATION ARCHITECTURE
ESM 360° Advisor
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Consolidated DB – MS SQL Server 2005
Client DB – Sybase SQL Anywhere 12
Client OS – MS Windows XP SP3
Client Application – C#.Net, C++, Crystal Reports
Data Synchronization – Sybase MobiLink
Device Management/File Synchronization – Sybase Afaria
4 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
SITUATION
Product End of Life
• Device Management/Data Synchronization platform
discontinued by vendor
– Replacement platform must support existing application
requirements
– Replacement platform must meet scale and performance
needs
5 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
CUSTOMER MANDATES
• Mission Critical Application cannot run on an unsupported
platform
• Keep costs low
– Limit expenses around shipping hardware back and forth
– Limit support staff remoting onto user machines
• Reduce impact to inflight feature delivery projects
• Maintain field productivity
– No end user interaction
– No end user downtime
6 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
REPLACEMENT PRODUCT SELECTION
• Proof of concept with multiple vendors
– Unique synchronization scenarios
– Application maintenance
– Performance
– AD integration
– Configuration management
• Selection
– Sybase SQL Anywhere/MobiLink for Data Synchronization
– Sybase Afaria for Device Management
7 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
SOLUTION
Phased I – Replace Data Synchronization
• Leveraged existing device management solution to deliver SQL
Anywhere 12/MobiLink install
– Limit to 5 Mb segments to manage bandwidth
– Have all large files resident on client machine well in
advance of the cutover
• Engaged Sybase Professional Services to build Data
Synchronization framework
• Ecolab team updated all client application software
– Support for SQL Anywhere 12
8 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
SOLUTION
Phased I – Replace Data Synchronization, cont
• Scripted process for client
– Install SQL Anywhere 12
– Deploy client DB
– Replace client applications
– Perform configuration
 Replace MSDE with SQL Anywhere 12
• Rollout Progression
– 250 user pilot
– 3500+ users over 6 weeks
– Groups of 200-300 users at a time
9 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
SOLUTION
Phase II – Replace Device Management/File Synchronization
• Leveraged existing device management solution to deliver
Afaria install
• Engaged Sybase Professional Services to build configure Afaria
Architecture and Channels
– Group assignments using with Active Directory
• Ecolab team developed synchronization management software
to coordinate MobiLink and Afaria tasks
10 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
SOLUTION
Phase II – Replace Device Management/File Synchronization, cont
• Scripted process
– Install software
– Perform configuration
• Rollout Progression
– 250 user pilot
– 3500+ users over 5 weeks
– Groups of 200-500 users at a time
11 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
BENEFITS
Afaria
• Support Reduction
– Afaria to Active Directory integration drives group
enrollment
• Bandwidth Utilization
– Afaria Improved compression of content
• Installation and initial configuration
• Duplicate/Copy/Paste/Comments within events
• Reporting flexibility
• Building events is flexible and more developer oriented
12 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
BENEFITS
MobiLink
• Flexibility
– Control at fine granularity
• Performance
– Real-time synchronization much faster than previous
solution
– Server-side delta capture in real-time
• Day to Day operations
– Reduced effort with server management
13 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
LESSONS LEARNED
• Software Version
– Needed to re-advertise the SQL Anywhere 12 client install
with EBF applied
• AD Authentication Integration
– Users forget credentials
– Cached credentials expired periodically
14 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
LESSONS LEARNED
• Field user client machine configuration out of date
– .Net Framework version
– XP SP3
– WMI corruption
– OS patches
• Connection method
– Users on dial-up, satellite and wireless failed due to
intermittent connectivity
• Support staff communication
– Two sets of procedures during conversion caused confusion
15 – Company Confidential – October 3, 2011
QUESTIONS
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