Adam HornICT ManagerLismore, New South Waleshttp://www.tccl.nsw.edu.au/
Trinity Catholic College is an independent co-educational secondary school situated in the city of Lismore in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales. The school traces its history back to 1886. Trinity have over 300 computers deployed over six dedicated computer laboratories and two libraries. There are in excess of 1250 users including students and staff.
Trinity Catholic College has 1250 users on 300 PCs. The network environment is mixed (Mac OSX/Windows/Linux) and access to the Internet is via a 2Mbit SHDSL Line. Authentication is Microsoft Active Directory.
Trinity's existing firewall and web content filtering was based on Websense™ and Microsoft™ ISA Server™. Adam Horn, Trinity's ICT Manager, found it was no longer providing adequate filtering and thus he started searching for a more powerful solution. He also needed to contain costs and minimise ongoing maintenance time and licensing costs.
Adam considered Smoothwall's hardware UTM appliance, but as he already had a suitable DELL server available, he requested an evaluation license and downloaded Smoothwall Guardian for installation on the existing server. Adam found that Smoothwall's integrated installation process was far simpler than other products he had used or tested that required separate installation of the operating system, web proxy, database and finally the web filter. This simplicity allowed him to get up and running fast.
Guardian easily met the key requirements of providing a secure firewall and blocking undesirable web content. Compared to the previous system Adam found fewer false positives and as a consequence a dramatic drop in complaints from school staff about over blocking, thus lowering the work load for IT staff. The previous system only provided filtering based on URLs, and so many students were easily able to bypass it. Smoothwall's affordable approach to licensing was well received and overall Adam was delighted with both Guardian and the level of service he received from SmoothWall's ANZ distributors, CustomTech. He says CustomTech staff were very helpful in assisting with the evaluation, and in the context of a pressured work environment, describes their support as 'a life-saver'.
Anonymous proxy sites were a real problem at the school before I implemented Guardian
Because of the soft appliance option, Guardian is very easy and quick to install - much, much faster than installing Windows Server, ISA server and another proxy server. I found it easy to use, with good built-in context sensitive help. I expected integration with Active Directory to be difficult, but this proved to be simple too and worked well, minimising the amount of individual user management required.
Choosing to test Smoothwall was definitely a smart decision. When a lot of students that could bypass the previous system complained that they could no longer get to certain sites, such as YouTube or eBay, I realised just how effective Guardian was. It is also very easy to block or unblock sites on an ad hoc basis.
There are considerable cost savings compared to my previous product. Guardian's modular design allows you to pay for only the components that you need, and to add modules later. I also read up on reports from Becta, which gave me added confidence that I was making the right decision.
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