RESEARCH

1
RESEARCH EDUCATION NETWORKS -A CASE STUDY IN
GHANA

• SCHOOL ON RADIO USE FOR
• INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY
• 3rd - 21st February 2003 , Trieste (Italy)
• Kwaku F. Awuye-Kpobi
• E-mail
  Kpobi_at_libr.ug.edu.gh
• Balme Library,
• University of Ghana

2
MAP OF GHANA
3
OBJECTIVES

• To bring all the research and educational
  institutions under one technological umbrella.
• To link all libraries in Educational Research
  for them to take advantage of e-journals.
  

4

• To harness the potential of resource-sharing
  among the universities and research centers
  

5
Locations covered Within Accra

• Ghana Atomic Energy Commission
• Center for Scientific Industrial research
• University of Ghana Medical School

6
Outside Accra

• Winneba (70Km from Accra)
• Kumasi (270KM from Accra)
• Cape-Coast (180Km from Accra)
• Tamale (800Km from Accra)

7
IMPLEMENTATION

• Acquisition of a VSAT (stationed Univ.. of Ghana)
• Extension of this link to the University Library
• Extension by Radio to some departments

8

• Made use of an existing Cylink Radio
  transmitting at 128kbps to link the Central
  Administration Blocks
• A mast was built at the Central Administration
  being the highest point on campus.
• 2 Principal Base stations were setup at the
  Central Administration
  
  

9

• One belonged to a private company which
  transmits data to from the REN to their base
  station in Accra for onward transmission to
  Kumasi and Cape-Coast
• So all the private company is supposed to be
  doing is tunneling data from University of Ghana
  to Kwame Nkrumah University of Science
  Technology and University of Cape-Coast at 64kbps

10

• The other base station which is managed by the
  university ICT staff is being use to serve the
  other institutions within Accra.
• Winneba is which about 70Km from Accra uses a
  special radio which makes use of the University
  of Ghana PABX system to dial-in
• A VSAT was procured for UDS at Tamale

11

• Making use of an existing Cylink Radio
  transmitting at 128kbps to link the Central
  Administration Blocks
• A mast was built at the Central Administration
  being the highest point on campus to host both
  the VHF and an Omni-directional antenna

12
(No Transcript)
13
PROBLEMS

• Power
• Expertise
• Mistrust between the private company and the
  University
• Funds
• Flat rate for participating institutions

14

• Threats of pulling out pulling out
• Accusations of University of Ghana hijacking the
  project to the detriment of the other
  institutions
• Confusion about payments and services.

15
SOLUTIONS

• The 128kbps Cylink was changed to an 11Mb/s Radio
  but due to LOS, it has not performed as expected
• Linux boxes were installed in KNUST UCC. These
  boxes which masqueraded IPS also have firewalls
  configured on them to make sure we have packets
  only from our designated networks

16

• A Stand-by power generating set was acquired for
  the VSAT but the intermediary nodes were left
  out and so the problem was not fully solved.
• GNCIC made connectivity to the other institutions
  possible

17
THE WAY FORWARD

• The radio link connecting the Central
  Administration is being replaced with fibre optic
  cable to improve connectivity to the other
  institutions.
• Trying to maximize the full capabilities of Open
  Source computing. E.g. Exploring Bandwidth
  management capabilities of Linux to manage the
  bandwidth allocation to individual institutions.

18

• It is also possible for individual institutions
  to acquire separate but smaller VSAT than what
  the project currently have and sharing the
  current bandwidth among them directly from source.

19
THANKS FOR YOUR ATTENTION