A large manufacturing company has an office full of Personal Computers running a combination of Windows 98, Windows 2000 Professional, and Windows XP. The company also has several Apple Macintosh computers in the design department. There is a Microsoft Windows 2003 Server for File-and-Print Services, and an IBM eServer p Series, running IBM’s version of UNIX - AIX which is running all of the “back office” tasks.

The company communicates with many of its customers and suppliers electronically, using EDI (Electronic Data Interchange). Some of these communications take place over regular telephone lines using modems, while others are encrypted transmissions sent over the Internet. All of this information must be transmitted and received reliably, accurately and securely.

In addition, there is a remote warehouse at the other end of the city. At that warehouse there are also a large number of PCs and even a couple of Macintosh computers. There is also a Microsoft Windows 2003 Server to provide File-and-Print services. All of these computers need to communicate with the IBM AIX system at Head Office.

Finally, at the warehouse, there are also stock pickers who wheel around picking carts. On these carts, they have PCs which display their picking information and there are also printers which print Picking Slips. But these PCs are connected to the office network using a Wireless LAN Bridge.

How can all of these widely different technologies talk to each other? That’s what Heterogeneous Networking is all about.

At Connectability, we specialize in developing solutions for scenarios like the one described above. We know how to make all of the various kinds of workstations and servers talk to each other. We know how to setup EDI communications and Wide Area Networks (WANs) between multiple locations. We know how to deploy Wireless solutions effectively.

And finally, we know how to make it all seamless and reliable!