Carnival Cruise Lines

Cruise Line Cuts Software Update Time by 80 Percent, Boosts Effectiveness by 20 Percent

Carnival Cruise Lines needs to deploy software and updates as effectively as possible to ships and offices worldwide, so it’s adopting Microsoft® System Center Configuration Manager 2007. The solution cuts update distribution time by 80 percent while boosting the effectiveness of distributions by 20 percent and increasing availability by up to 10 percent. And System Center Configuration Manager is crucial to Carnival’s planned deployment of Windows Vista®.

 

Business Needs

To its 3.6 million guests each year, Carnival’s fleet of 22 ships epitomizes fun and relaxation. What those guests don’t see is that the ships are also floating high-tech environments, each loaded with about 20 computer servers and 250 personal computers. In all, Carnival Cruise Lines—the largest and most popular cruise line in the world, according to the company—manages 850 servers and 5,200 personal computers among its fleet, its Miami headquarters, and offices in Miramar and Fort Pierce, Florida, and Colorado Springs, Colorado.

We saw great results with Systems Management Server. And when Configuration Manager became available, we saw it could do even more to meet our needs for operating system deployment, system maintenance, and control of our environment. Rodney Orange Supervisor, Wintel Server Engineering Team at Carnival Cruise Lines

But as Carnival expanded its technology infrastructure and came to rely on it for an increasing range of solutions, managing that environment also became more difficult. The company was using a variety of products to manage the environment, including Symantec OnCommand Console and St. Bernard Software Expert for operating system and application updates, Ghost for full deployments, and custom scripts and deployment packages. As Carnival came to require more from its infrastructure, these tools weren’t as efficient.

Software distribution packages became larger, taking more time to deploy. An IT staffer needed 20 hours each month to build update packages, then a team of 4 worked 4 hours a day for 10 days to deploy and troubleshoot the distributions. The process was so time consuming that Carnival often missed its 10-day goal to deploy updates. Meanwhile, operating system deployment was equally problematic—and frustrating since, with 5,200 personal computers, some machines were being reimaged every day.

Server management was another issue. With ships constantly at sea, Carnival is a 24 x 7 operation. Yet updating a computer server too often meant putting that machine into automatic reboot when it was needed for revenue-producing functions. As Carnival contemplated deployment of the Windows Vista® operating system, IT managers knew they needed another solution.

Solution

They found that solution in Microsoft® System Center Configuration Manager 2007, the successor to the Systems Management Server 2003 software that Carnival had begun to deploy on some of its ships. Carnival is now in the midst of a full rollout of System Center Configuration Manager across its entire enterprise, replacing the variety of tools it has used until now. 

The company is using System Center Configuration Manager for distribution of software updates to both servers and personal computers. The Maintenance Windows feature of System Center Configuration Manager enables Carnival to schedule updates for the specific times that servers are available.

With developers and engineering staff pushing multiple updates and changes to the servers, Carnival takes advantage of the Desired Configuration Manager (DCM) feature of Configuration Manager to monitor and maintain baseline parameters in its Domain Controllers.

Client-side security updates are approved by IT managers, added to the update list in the Configuration Manager Console, and the updates are downloaded in about 15 minutes, in contrast to the hours that it took to build custom packages. The packages are tested and then deployed. Users click on a pop-up to install the updates within the 10-day deployment period. Updates are implemented automatically after that.

Carnival is testing System Center Configuration Manger to deploy Windows Vista and anticipates using it for deployment of the Windows Server® 2008 operating system, as well. The solution inventories the Carnival environment and delivers reports enabling IT managers to identify which machines are Windows Vista–ready and which need upgrades or replacement. The information not only helps to ensure effective deployment but also provides information for accurate budgeting for new hardware.

Benefits

“We saw great results with Systems Management Server,” says Rodney Orange, Supervisor, Wintel Server Engineering Team at Carnival. “And when Configuration Manager became available, we saw it could do even more to meet our needs for operating system deployment, system maintenance, and control of our environment.”

System Center Configuration Manager eliminates the hours that the Carnival IT team spent on distribution packages. Updates are also deployed more reliably—Orange estimates that successful distributions have risen from 75 to 90 percent—which also reduces the time that technicians spend on troubleshooting. “We’ve cut the time we devote to software updates by 80 percent while increasing the effectiveness of those updates,” says Orange. “That’s time we can reinvest in adding real value to our environment.”

IT administrators also benefit from the Configuration Manager Console. The greater ease of use of the redesigned console, combined with its modularity, allows Carnival to create role-specific versions for the Help Desk, Engineering team, and others, allowing them to complete their tasks more quickly and easily.

IT staffers aren’t the only ones boosting productivity through System Center Configuration Manager. With updates deployed to servers when users are less likely to be accessing them, Orange expects server availability to climb up to 10 percent, from about 90 percent to up to 99 percent, benefitting the users who depend on those servers.

Users avoid productivity hits when the Help Desk pushes out applications—both Microsoft-based and third-party applications—because System Center Configuration Manager doesn’t require the Help Desk to take temporary control of desktops, locking them out.

Users also control when their personal computers are updated, further eliminating drags on productivity. “Before, users might forget to save work at the end of the day and come back in the morning to find an updated and rebooted PC—with their latest work gone,” says Tom DeLuca, Supervisor, End User Computing and Messaging at Carnival. “With Configuration Manager, we give the users control over when their machines will update and reboot.”

The comprehensive reporting capability of System Center Configuration Manager allows Carnival to monitor the effectiveness of software updates and deployments, software licensing and use, and hardware components—and to put that information to work to benefit the company.

For example, the reports on which machines are Windows Vista–capable and which aren’t have helped Carnival cut its estimated deployment time for the new desktop operating system in half, saving three months.

Reports on software metering are enabling Carnival to instantly identify what licensed software is being used and what isn’t.

“In the past, we could identify which machines had an executable file for a specific application—but that didn’t mean the application was being run,” says Orange. “Now, we know which applications we’re really running, and which versions we’re using. That means we can negotiate the next version of our Enterprise Agreement more effectively.”

“With Configuration Manager, we have a better understanding of our environment,” says Orange. “We’re not caught unaware when we get requests for information. And we can create custom reports to meet budgeting or operational needs elsewhere in the company.”