Yogyakarta State University, on the island of Java in Indonesia, has successfully deployed a fast, secure Wi-Fi across its campus, benefiting large numbers of staff and students.
Yogyakarta State University has undergone a radical transformation in recent years. Originally founded in the merger between two teacher education institutes, the university now teaches more than 25,000 students across a variety of disciplines. The expansion also required the hiring of hundreds of members of staff.
“The university today is very different to what it was previously,” commented ArifKurniawan, Network and Communication Division Manager at Yogyakarta State University. “And as the university changed, so did our networking requirements.”
Yogyakarta State University put a strong emphasis on deploying the latest teaching methods in its seminar rooms and lecture halls, and that included enabling students to access the internet on their devices. “We needed a reliable, capable network technology that supported the new learning methods,” continued Kurniawan. “We had a network solution in place but it just wasn’t delivering.”
A particular issue was network administration and security. Before the University deployed a solution from Ruckus Wireless, students and staff accessed a common network. That resulted in the occasional misuse of others’ accounts, and IT staff at the university also found themselves spending a large amount of time dealing with simple matters such as network access resets.
To address these issues, the Yogyakarta State University conducted trials using equipment supplied by Ruckus, Cisco, Juniper Networks and HP Networks. “Ruckus was the standout solution,” continued Kurniawan. “The features they showed us were simply superior.”
After the trial, the University deployed 50 Ruckus ZoneFlex7982 and 50 ZoneFlex 7372 access points (APs), supported by two Ruckus ZoneDirector3000 controllers. The 7372 and 7982 APs feature Ruckus patented BeamFlexand BeamFlex+ adaptive antenna technology respectively, which enables the antenna system within an AP to continually sense and optimize for its environment.
“We’re so pleased with the Ruckus solution,” concluded Kurniawan. “There is less down time for students and staff and fewer complaints. The network is much more secure now, and we’re already planning to expand the Ruckus footprint here at the University.”