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VERDICTSOFTFULLPAPER.docx

Running head: SERVER ADMINISTRATION SERVICES

SERVER ADMINISTRATION SERVICES 21

Server Administration Services

Action Research

IST8101

Rohith Kumar Kondapally

Table of contents

Introduction 4

Methodology 6

L iterature review 8

i ntroduction 8

Literature Review 11

Proposal 17

Visual Representation 19

F irst iteration 20

S econd iteration 24

T hird iteration 26

F ourth iteration 29

S ummary of learning 31

C onclusion 33

R eferences 34

List of figures

figure 1: VerdicSoft enterprise business services 5

figure 2: VerdicSoft database service 8

figure 3: VerdicSoft infrastructure-managed service 10

Figure 4: Common tasks of a server administrator 11

Figure 5: Server support and administrtion services service provider 13

Figure 6 : Representation of server administration 15

Figure 7 : Server administration 17

Figure 8 : Visual representation 19

Figure 9 : system model of action research 28

Figure 8 : Action research 31

Introduction

Since its inception in 1999, Vedicsoft has grown to what is today a leading Business Intelligence (BI) firm with about 400 employees across the globe (Vedicsoft Solutions LLC, 2016). Vedicsoft has dealt with handling operations in areas such as system performance and data growth. In today's world, businesses’ demands are getting more and more complex, and managing employees as well as IT operations getting even more expensive. Vedicsoft has for over a decade offered reliability and efficiency in the way its information technology infrastructure library caters to the needs of its clients. This 17 year experience has also made Vedicsoft capable of transforming its business solutions to fit the custom demands of any of its clients.

Vedicsoft's planned expansion into the security, networking, and data centers is a new way for it to reach even more clients while at the same time offer more flexibility to their current clients. In their database administration solutions, the offer services ranging from staffing services to remote database administration services. Vedicsoft has a wide range of application management solutions in its portfolio as well, showing its capacity to handle tasks such as cloning and concurrent request management. These services not only push Vedicsoft what it is today, but also ensure the security and satisfaction of its clients (Vedicsoft Solutions LLC, 2016).

Probably one of Vedicsoft's greatest achievements is their server administration solutions. Competence in this area requires a company that shows dedication in not only its infrastructure but also its staffing. According to the FCC the threats facing web servers is on the rise, and for companies to stay safe, they are needed to invest a lot in this sector. Vedicsoft comes in with simplified solutions that are not only cost effective but also implemented in a timely manner. Most businesses today are required to plan for data loss or data theft, and Vedicsoft has the capacity to handle such issues. Handling servers remotely is however not as secure as many companies believe; therefore, Vedicsoft's insistence on utilizing dated servers such as Windows Server 2012 and 2008 R2 or the Apache Web Server may pose a security risk.

C:\Users\simonmuriu\Desktop\VedicSoft-Enterprise-Business-Services.png

Figure 1: VerdicSoft enterprise business services (VerdicSoft Solutions LLC, 2016)

Methodology

Action research is the research method involving the active participation of the solving of a problem by the victims of the problem. The goal the participants aim to achieve is improve the way they find solutions and exerciser these solutions. Action research involves one major step, research, carried out in order to better understand the hidden problems and help predict future organizational and individual change. Action research (AR) may not be capable of finding solutions to some problems that face an organization and its employees, but what it is capable of is keeping its objectives clear (Passmore 2001).

AR tests the problem solving capabilities of the individuals in an organization to not only ensure efficiency, but also document individual reaction to change to better prepare for the future. It follows a limited time frame which accompanies the same time frame the problem solving process will take(Nielsen, 2006). When conducting social research experiments, it is important to ensure that those participating and those conducting the research fully comprehend the problem (Eddie 2001). As Eddie described it, action research demands that the researcher be an active participant of the reality, therefore obtaining a firsthand view of how change affects the organization as a whole.

The research to be conducted on Vedicsoft will involve detailed observations of how they conduct a server upgrade, and how the server change affects the organization not only in its performance and security but also socially. An AR is the most conducive tool to utilize in this scenario since my position as intern will also mean that I take part in the change as I document it. Action research can easily be integrated into this scenario and since it has such few steps, the whole task may take less time and effort. Martin (1989) found a somewhat similar situation to this one and implemented AR efficiently.

The basic steps in AR are planning, acting on the plans and finally reviewing the results. These three steps result in a research method that is both quantitative and participative (Eddie 2001). There are a few approaches that exist within AR and selecting the correct one to use in each case can be tasking (Greenwood 2002). Examples of these approaches include the soft systems methodology (Whyte, 1991), the action science methodology has been well utilized in past examples (Anderson 1993). Another methodology in action research is participatory action research, depicted as being a process oriented method. Some examples of where this is utilized show a great deal of success if effectively put to use (Whyte, 1991).

The results from participatory action research examples lead to an understanding of the need for a strong methodological framework. A clearly defined methodological framework will be the key to a successful Action research exercise. Data collection is also a key element in the AR exercise as it will give us the statistics to examine and prepare well in advance of another organizational change. During the process of data collection, plans of change will be created and will later on be refined as whole exercise proceeds. As Vedicsoft supports both offshore and onshore services, there might be some gaps in data collected as the research team will only be limited to onshore observations. The main team performing data collection will include me and part of the Vedicsoft employee body.

As Jungk (1981) described it, a social experiment followed by researchers cannot remove the fear, but it can greatly reduce it. Part of this research is motivated by the need for Vedicsoft so accept change and implement better and more secure systems on their servers and those of their clients. There is also another motivation that the staff at Vedicsoft accept that change in a BI company is common and there is a need to eliminate the fear that comes with it. Outdated servers and operating systems can create great problems to the organizations using them, this is according to the FCC, but a simple Action research could help find a solution to this.

Literature review

Introduction

Among the major IT tasks of an ideal company is the management of the servers, what is mainly regarded as server administration. As always with businesses and the prime objective has been to maximize income while minimizing costs. One way minimizing the costs has been the implementation of distributed computing that offered the advantage of sharing resources. Vedicsoft is a company that offers, among other services, server administration services to businesses. This business opportunity has emanated from the fact that businesses have realized that they can increase their productivity or returns through outsourcing some services so that they can focus on the core competencies.

C:\Users\simonmuriu\Desktop\VedicSoft-Database-Service.png

Figure 2: VerdicSoft database Service (VerdicSoft Solutions LLC, 2016).

The distributed computing has just created a business opportunity exploited by Vedicsoft and other similar companies. The concept of distributed computing has seen an unprecedented growth in the past few decades and it now encompasses several activities in today’s world computer and communications. Distributed computing is about distributed systems and networks, and this is an areas that has wide applications. Among these applications include wireless communication, the Internet, cloud computing or parallel computing, mobile networks, and multicore systems (Wattenhofer, 2015). With these wide applications of distributed computing, the concept of server and server administration has emerged. The concept of servers and server administration is a deviation from the traditional data processing whereby the data processing was (even today to some extent) centralized. The traditional data processing entailed centralized computers and data, as well as processing and management. This did change with time with the introduction of distributed computing.

Distributed computing, specifically distributed data processing has deviated from the centralized model in various ways. One such way is that smaller computers are dispersed throughout the organization called peer to peer architecture. These computers are interconnected with a central bigger computer called the server. The interconnections are either private or public and they may be dedicated, Internet or intranet (Bremer, 2008). The distributed data processing is often preferred because of the accruing benefits. In a distributed data processing, there is improved responsiveness, availability, and incremental growth. More so, it allows for resource sharing and end-user productivity, as well as increased user involvement and control.

C:\Users\simonmuriu\Desktop\VedicSoft-Infrastructure-Managed-Service.png

Figure 3: VerdicSoft infrastructure-managed Service (VerdicSoft Solutions LLC, 2016).

Literature Review

Server administration services entail those services offered in the management of the client/server computing (Bremer, 2008). According to Toulemonde, et al. (1998), the client/server computing model defines trhe existence of a client and a server, and the service often entails data or a function, or resources that are to be shared. The server is often remote thereby necessitating communications to connect the clients and the servers.

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Figure 4: Common tasks of a server administrator

With this background to the concepts of servers, we can now try to understand the concept of servr administration in an organizational context. There are companies that offer server administration services to businesses. Vedicsoft is one such companies that have been leaders in terms of business intelligence. Such companies often tend to derive their competitiveness from understanding the customers’ needs and customizing their services. The business gap that is filled by Vedicsoft and such companies is the high costs of maintaining IT infrastructure, whereby the companies will opt to outsource some IT functions like server administration to third parties (VerdicSoft Solutions LLC, 2016). Compnies like Vedicsoft will provide server managemet services to the customers who have installed distributed data processing systems to share the access to the databases, and share various other resources. This is the essence of distriduted data processing or distributed computing.

Vedicsoft is cognizant of the fact the modern computig environment has evolved, and that businesses seek to minimize costs while deriving maximum benefits from the IT infrastructure. The modern computing environment no longer consists of just one computer, rather, there are several of them interconnected to share resources and make work easier. This minimizes costs while maximizing benefits of improved responsiveness, shared resources, and end-user productivity. In theory, it would be easier to posit that the fairest arrangement of the computers is the one whereby all the computers have equal speed and same amout of memory as this would make all the individual computers equally powerful. This would easily imply that all the computers will be eqully resourced and that the resources are shared in a fair manner. However, Gimore (2001) is quick to note that this is practically not the case because there will be users with tasks that are either more time consuming or more memory-hungry, or both. In that case, the resources would not be shared fairly. The servers tend to solve this problem whereby one machine that is more poweful than the rest is purchased, and then the rest of the computers connected to it to provide the users with ocassional access to the more poweful machine.

C:\Users\simonmuriu\Downloads\server-support-administration-service-250x250.jpg

Figure 5: Server Support & Administration Services Service Provider

Server administration, as mentioned above, is the management of the servers to ensure that the resources are allocated faily among the suers. In an organization setting, this is always the case where a central server with a central database is connected to the several comouters in the various departments. Vedicsoft and other companies offer server adminostration services that are simply the management of the servers. What are some of the server administration services? Among the key server adminstration servces is the handling of the threats to the server and possibly to the clients. In short, this is to ensure that the security of the entire system. Just as is the case with other computing models, security has always been a key problem that must be handled with care if the organizarion are to survive. We are living in an information age where the loss of a company’s information might lead to its death, or where leakage of a company’s information may lead to loss of markets and competitiveness. As such, the main concern in the server administration, rather than managing the resource sahring, data storage and maintenace, it the security. According REMSYS (2016), most companies tend to be too busy developing their businesses to pay adequate attention to the server management, not until something goes wrong. This is also to insinuate that most companies are in the dark about the newest sever management trends, others do not have the required expertise, and industry knowledge to enabe them keep pace with the server developments. In that case, Vedicsoft and other companies come in to ensure that they bridge this gap by offering the server administration services.

In terms of security, the server administration providers ought to understand the trends in the world wide web attacks. This is because the newest target in these attacks are the workstations, and this is because the attacks on the server directly are no longer easy (Levy & Arce, 2006). The world wide web is, as such, the new playground, and this is primarily because many of the web applications run on the web servers and offer to the users services over a network. It is, therefore, imperative for the companies offering the server administration services to be fully aware of these trends. As will be established in this action research, the server administrators have a task to ensure the security of the servers and each provider will have its own set of mechanimsms for handling threats. Vedicsoft will only serve as the reference point and will help establish and understand most of the concepts relating to server administration.

C:\Users\simonmuriu\Downloads\system_admin_service_a.png

Figure 6: Representation of server administration

It is also important to note that the various companies offering server administration or server management services are not similar, neither are their services similar. This raises the question of what is server management? Or what does server administration services entail? Huckaby (2012) tries to explain what is server management. He conducted a survey of about 100 seever management companies, and one thing that he observed was that there was no consistent and minimum set of services that could be said to constitute server management package. All the companies sell different services under the banner server management. As such, there is no clear standards for the server administration services meaning that the customers ought to be very careful with the company they contract with for server administration services. This is among the key issues intended for this action research ehereby insight into the topic of server administration services will be soughted. In short, there is need to understand this paradigm of same name, but different services. Does server administration services entail just support services on the servers’ operating systems? Or do they include offering personnel to manage the customers’ servers? There are key qestions because companies like Vedicsoft offer staffing services to the customers. What do these staffing services entail? Does Vedicsoft and other companies offer customized services to their cutomers? Indeed, the concept of server administration services need to be understood better, clear defenitions, and categorizations made in order to establish some standards in the concept.

https://www.pureaccessit.com/images/pure_net/images/active-directory.gif

Figure 7: Server administration

Proposal

This action research aims at understanding the sever administration services are related concepts. The proposal will focus on a popular server administration service provider called Vedicsoft that will be the baseline in establishing the ideal server management services. The need for this action research is the fact that the companies have realized that handling servers remotely may offer advantages, but this may not be as safe as would be expected and that there risks involved therein. More so, there are costs related to managing the IT infrastructure that could be minimized by using the remote administrators. In that case, the companies have a challenge determining the trade-off between the two. This proposal also seeks to establish how the server administration service providers seek to meet customer needs owing to the fact that they are many of them bearing same banner but offering different services. There will be four iterations in this action research and these are as discussed below:

Iteration 1: Study topic/problem

This iteration will entail the definition and description of the problem or the study topic. This gives direction of what is to be done and to what end is the action research to be conducted.

Iteration 2: Determination of study objectives and the action plan

The second iteration will entail the determination of the objectives of the action research, and a description of the plan of action. The objectives will be the foundation of the study and the plan of action the direction or the steps and actions to be undertaken in the research.

Iteration 3: Data collection and analysis

This iteration will entail collecting data pertaining to the problem identified or the research topic under study. The data will also be analysed here using the various statistical tools and methods. The data collection methods and techniques will also be determined depending on the nature of the research.

Iteration 4: Findings, reporting and further research

This will be the last iteration and will entail a discussion of the collected and analysed data. The findings will be discussed and presented in a report format. More so, there will be determined gaps for further research.

Visual representation

The diagram presented below represents the visual representation of this proposal

Action research

Iteration 1: Study topic/problem

Iteration 4: Findings, further research

Iteration 3: Data collection, analysis

Iteration 2: Objectives/action plan

Figure 8: Visual representation

First Iteration: Study topic/problem

Plan

The planning stage is one of the critical phases in an action research that entails outlining the things that will be done, how, and when they will be done. A plan can be defined as a set schedule of activities or procedures on a project or a process. It is also a sequence of activities or events arranged from the first to the last until the ultimate goal is arrived at. In this case, the planning phase of the first iteration in this action research entails outlining various things that needed to be done. In order to aid in the definition of the study topic and/or problem. The first iteration, as discussed above is about defining the problem to be studied in this action research. The things that need to be planned for include the following:

i. Time frame for each activity

ii. Resources needed- that is, the sources of information pertaining to the said topic

iii. The field of study determined

iv. The objective and goals of the iteration

v. The steps to be followed

vi. An assessment of the plan validity

vii. The expected outcome of the iteration clearly defined

The time frame for this iteration was planned to be approximately 10 hours, within which all the activities must be competed, and the outcome is obtained. The primary questions asked in this iteration were what and who with regard to the server administration services- that is, who offers these services, and what does these services entail.

Action

Action can be defined as the actual performance of the activities or procedures outlined in the planning phase. It is in this phase where the things planned are actualized or materialized, or implemented. The determined field of study was server administration, and the more specific topics were the server administration services and related concept. The resources required were determined to be sources of information pertaining to the server administration services, and these included books, journals, and online sources. The ultimate objective was to define the study topic and the action phase already defined it as server administration services.

The activities or the steps that were followed in the action phase were as follows:

i. The topic of study was decided to server administration services.

ii. Selected documents containing information about the selected topic were consulted, the relevant data were obtained, and analysed.

iii. The reference company was determined to be Vedicsoft.

iv. All information pertaining to the services offered by Vedicsoft was obtained from the various sources including their websites and case studies. This was set as the baseline for the server administration services.

v. Various other service providers were identified and compared to the Vedicsoft.

The performance of these activities were vital to arrive at the expected goal. These activities were undertaken keeping in mind that they have to follow the plans, and perhaps make necessary changes to the plans if the plans seemed practically defective. The outcome was what mattered the most, not the adherence to the plan, and any necessary changes could be made. For example, slight modifications on the number of concepts to be discussed, and the extent to which they would be discussed.

Observe

During and after the action phase, the observation phase follows in an attempt to learn the various things resulting from the previous stages. In other words, the observation phase is all about studying the various aspects of the planning phase and action phase, with a prime aim of establishing if the right things are being done. If the outcome obtained is the expected outcome, if there are deviations from the expected outcomes, or if the action phase exhausted everything that was laid down in the planning stage such are the questions that are answered in this phase. It may appear as if the observation phase is similar to the concept of control, but in practice, they are different in that control aims at corrective measures while the observation is mere learning or studying the processes, procedures or the series of activities.

In the first iteration, the observations that were made included whether the resources stated were adequate for the entire action phase. It was observed that the resources were indeed sufficient. It was also observable that the ultimate objective of the iteration was achieved, and that the problem was identified with precision. More so, it was observed that the topic was grossly general in scope, and that more specific scope would have been easier to handle. The scope entailed generally the sever administration services, and this meant several aspects were to be taken into account including the various definitions, features, and the examples of server administration service providers. All in all, there is no hitch observed in the first iteration of this action research as everything turned out to be perfect in the end.

Reflect

The last phase of the iteration is reflection phase. In principle, one will always take some time to reflect on something that has happened and will answer questions of how, what, when, and who among others. In this case, the reflection phase is a deliberate effort to revisit the entire process. It is simply a recap of the lessons learnt and knowledge gained from undertaking the previous phases of planning, action and observation. Reflecting on the previous sections reveals what has been learnt from them, and learning the outcomes of the iteration. The several things that were reflected on in this iteration included the effectiveness of the various actions that were undertaken- that is, were they effective or ineffective? What actions brought about the success of the iteration? Were the outcomes obtained the expected or ideal outcomes? Or was there a better set of actions that would have yielded similar or better results?

Another thing to reflect on in this iteration was the various difficulties or challenges experienced by the researcher. The primary challenge was finding adequate data pertaining to the topic, mainly because of the seemingly scattered information. To come up with a proper definition, one had to work from scratch, gather scattered pieces of information, bring them together and try to come up with something concrete. This, however, was largely successful and the end results were as expected. More so, the fact that there were different notions of the concept of server administration services was worth reflecting on because of the need to establish the ideal practices that could be used for purposes like benchmarking and comparison among the various service providers in the industry. The ideal practices were worth establishing because of the wide contrasts in the services offered and also the level of customizations across.

Second iteration: Study objectives and action plan

Plan

The second iteration is about the determination of the objectives of the action research, as well as the course of action to be taken. The planning phase entails deciding on how to go about the determination of the objectives and the course of action. The plan is to lay down all things that are needed to be researched, and this includes deciding on the topic and the reference company. The sequence of activities to be followed in determining the best course of action from alternatives is also determined in the planning phase.

Action

The action phase is the actual performance of the activities as laid out in the plan. In this action phase, literature was reviewed to gain insight into the concept server administration in theory and in practice. This gave the researcher a point from where to begin and also get an appropriate course of action. The study objectives were determined, and these are as follows:

· Establish what the term server administration entails

· Define and explain the concept, as well as other related concepts

· Collect firsthand hand data pertaining to server administration from a relevant company in order to gain the practical view on the concept.

The course of action was also determined, and the activities to be undertaken are as follows:

· Review literature pertaining to the concept

· Gather data on the concept and related concepts (focus on definition and the types of services offered)

· Carryout field research on VerdicSoft Company and establish the server administration services.

· Compile analyze the data and compile report as necessary

· Analyze gaps, and identify areas for further study

Observe

There are a number of things to learn from the second iteration, beginning with the fact that the phase carried quite some weight in the entire action research. This is because all the other iterations depended mostly on this iteration. In other words, the objectives were set in this iteration, meaning the rest of the iterations are guided by this. The actions in the rest of the iterations will be designed to meet the requirements set in this iteration. Secondly, action phase of the iteration had to modify the plan slightly, and this was in terms of the things to do first. In the determination of the topic, literature was read in order to establish the topic to be studied, and a repetitive action was to be taken here in terms of the determination of the objectives. However, the case was a little bit more focused while the earlier one was very broad.

Reflect

Reflecting on this iteration, the objectives are the determining factor in the success of the action research, primarily because poorly defined objectives mean derailed discourse of reason and action. While the iteration was largely a success, the main challenge was the planning, because the iteration in itself was a merely a plan. In that case, more emphasis was given to the action phase and not to the planning phase.

Third iteration: Data collection and analysis

Plan

The third iteration is the actual collection of data, and the consequent analysis of the data. The planning phase has so much to take into account, and it entails the following:

· Determining what data or type of data to collect

· Determining the tools, methods, and instruments to use in the data collection, as well as the data analysis

· The time when the data is to be collected, and the scheduling of the various activities

· The place where the data is to be collected

· Budgeting – the costs or expenses to incur in the data collection and analysis

The plans were to collect data, both secondary and primary. Secondary data is to be obtained from the already available literature, while primary data was to be collected from the field study – that is, study on VerdicSoft Company. The data was to simply analyzed to obtain definitions and explanations to the concept of server administration, and to get a clue on the server administration services.

Action

This is the actualization of the plan as laid out earlier. Literature pertaining to the concept was read, and the field study was conducted. The main aim here was to collected data related to server administration services, so focus was on the definitions, examples, and explanations. The field study was to establish the services offered by the company with respect server administration services offered by the company. In the field study, questionnaires were administered, and observations made through the interactions with the company staff. To add more weight to this study, the company’s website was also searched for more information about the topic.

The data analysis was simply reviewing the responses from the questionnaires and the points taken from the observation and the literature review, and then answering the following questions:

· What is server administration?

· What are the server administration services?

· What are some of the services that VerdicSoft offer that are related to server administration?

Observation

In this iteration, it was observed that the concept of server administration is a wide topic, but not always easy to break it down. The research was a general one, and also elementary in nature in the sense that it simply sought an explanation of what is server administration, and what services are offered by the server administration companies. The actions proceeded as per the plan without major modifications. As an action research on a relatively new concept, review of literature is mostly for the purposes of verifying the data obtained from the filed study, and this applied in this action research. All in all, data was available, and the above questions were answered accordingly- that is, the data administration was defied, the services involved in server administration identified, and also the services offered by VerdicSoft relating to server administration also established.

Reflect

This iteration was the core iteration sine it entailed the actual actions towards the set objectives, and an actualization of the plan of action. In most cases, the actions tend to be modified due to uncertainties in the planning phase. The planning phase lays out the way forward- that is, some future actions, but the future is always uncertain. Among the uncertainties in this action research was the kind of response to expect from the employees filling the questionnaires. It was all assumed that the right response would be obtained. In general, over 98 % of the responses were appreciated, and the other 2 % was either the employee did not have adequate time to respond or they did not want to cooperate at all. However, the entire iteration was largely a success, as the necessary data was obtained, an analysis of which gave the desire feedback.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/97/SystemsModelofActionResearchProcess.png

Figure 9: System model of action research

Fourth iteration: Findings, reporting, and further research

Plan

The last iteration was to present the findings, draft the report, and recommend further action. The planning phase simply is an outline of how all of this will be done. The primary plan is to compile the findings from the data analysis in the form of a report and also suggest further studies. The findings to be presented will entail the information relating to the concept of server administration services and other related concepts as per this study.

Action

The action phase is the actual presentation of the refined data from the previous iteration. The objectives were to define and discuss the details of server administration services, and these were obtained from the previous iteration. In this phase, the refined data pertaining to the concept entails the following:

· Server administration services are those services offered by companies like VerdicSoft that have to do with the management of the client/server computing.

· The company (VerdicSoft) provided a central server whereby the clients are connected, and the service offered include networking, database management, database maintenance, and IT infrastructure security.

The action for further research was also identified, and this was brought about by the fact that the action research did not consider the services offered by other companies, which leaves the doubt of whether all companies offer the same of different services. As mentioned earlier on in the literature review, there tends to be a lot of customization in this area often due the differences in the needs of the clients.

Observe

This phase entails looking back at the previous phases, and a few things were observable. First, the iteration was finalizing the entire action research with the presentation of the findings and a recommendation for future study. Secondly, the objectives of the action research were achieved, because the answers obtained in the action research and as presented in this iteration is a reflection of whatever was mentioned in the objectives. As has been mentioned earlier on, a good observation will be essential for the iterations that follow, owing to the fact that challenges will be identified and perhaps will be taken into consideration in the planning and undertaking the iterations that follow. However, this is the last iteration, but does not mean observation is not necessary. This is because future actions will be taken, and what is done now lays a foundation for a future action.

Reflect

A reflection at this iteration, as well as at the entire action research reveals that the overall activity was a success, and the objectives of the study were achieved. In an action research, there always chances of discovering gaps or further areas of exploration, and this makes study a continuous process.

http://research.education.nmsu.edu/files/2014/01/action_research.jpg

Figure 10: Action research

Summary of learning

Service-related research has been conducted for decades with applications in almost all disciplines (Perry & Imperial, 2001). This action research was a form of service-related research on the services offered by a server administration services company, VerdicSoft Solutions LLC. With this action research, there are several lessons to learn, both about the nature of action research, and the topic under research. The six characteristics of action research as discussed by Susman and Evered (2012)are:

· Action research is future oriented, therefore, it has close affinities to planning processes.

· Action research is collaborative, meaning that the interdependencies between the researcher and the client system are essential.

· Action research implies system development, meaning it encourages the development of a system capacity.

· Action research generates theory grounded in action. The theory guides the researcher on what is to be considered in the organizational diagnoses.

· Action research is agnostic, meaning the researcher is cognizant of the fact that his or her theories and prescriptions for action are the result of an action taken previously.

· Action research is situational, meaning that the researcher needs to know that most relationships between events, people, and things are the function of the situation.

Server administration services entail a conglomeration of IT related services. VerdicSoft Solutions LLC offers a good number of these services that cover almost all sectors, for example, banking and finance; retail; automotive; travel, transport and logistics; telecom, media and semiconductor, etc. The products offered by VerdicSoft include ERP, CRM, SCM, BIS & DW, and EAI. The services include the following:

· Process consulting

· Product evaluation

· End-to-end implementation

· Healthcare/audit

· Version migration

· Rollouts

· Production support

· Maintenance

· Enhancements

Being a representative of the entire industry, VerdicSoft case has revealed that the focus os on the core IT areas of a business, and these include the intranet, internet, and cloud and virtualization. Being core IT areas, they need specialized attention and because the companies may not have the required expertise, or because it may be more expensive to hire one, the businesses opt to outsource these services to companies like VerdicSoft.

Conclusion

The research to be conducted on Vedicsoft will involve detailed observations of how they conduct a server upgrade, and how the server change affects the organization not only in its performance and security but also socially. An AR is the most conducive tool to utilize in this scenario since my position as intern will also mean that I take part in the change as I document it. Action research can easily be integrated into this scenario and since it has such few steps, the whole task may take less time and effort.

The action research had four iterations that each edged the researcher towards the goal. These are determination of the study topic or problem, determination of the study objectives and the action plan, data collection and analysis, and presentation of findings, reporting and further research. The various services in server administration were established, and this was the ultimate goal has been defined as method involving the active participation of the solving of a problem by the victims of the problem. The goal the participants aim to achieve is improve the way they find solutions and exerciser these solutions. Action research involves one major step, research, carried out in order to better understand the hidden problems and help predict future organizational and individual change

References

Bremer, D. (2008). Client/Server and Distributed Computing. Operating Systems: Internals and Design Principles. Retrieved from http://cs.gmu.edu/~hfoxwell/cs571/DistributedCS571.pdf

Edge, J. (2001). Action research. Alexandria, Va.: Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages.

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