case study

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Housed in the historic 19th century Bourse (Stock Exchange) building in the heart of Lyon, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Lyon CCI) plays a key role in the development of France’s second biggest regional economy. The CCI consults with and lobbies government representatives and politicians at local, national and international levels to defend the interests of 58,000 businesses in and around Lyon. It supports the creation, acquisition, and development of member businesses.

The problem

Many of the applications developed for use internally at the CCI were developped for compatibility with version 6 of Microsoft’s Windows Internet Explorer (aka IE6). More recent applications, however, have been developed for compatibility with version 7. And as most web development pros know, an IE6-optimized application is highly likely to be incompatible with IE7 – and vice-versa.

So how could the IT services at the CCI reliably deliver access to older applications and more recent ones, given that it’s impossible to install both versions of IE on a single desktop?

Virtual Browser provides the solution

The Virtual Browser solution resolves the problem by integrating IE6 as the browsing environment in the users’ Virtual Browser session. The Virtual Browser session thus ensures full support for older, IE6-compatible applications while the desktop IE7 installation allows users to access more recently developed web applications.

Users are satisfied as they continue to use the older applications transparently while benefiting from the improved features of IE7 for newer applications. For the CCI, using Virtual Browser to deliver compatibility in a mixed environment means significant cost savings compared with upgrading or re-writing applications for IE7:

“There’s no doubt that the cost of developing and upgrading all our applications bears no comparison with the cost of rolling out Virtual Browser” says Albert Levigne, CIO – Lyon CCI.

Why choose Virtual Browser by commonIT?

The Lyon Chamber of Commerce and Industry chose Virtual Browser for:

• The ease of deployment of the Virtual Browser agent to 600 end-points.
• End-user performance and ease of use.
• The innovative approach which resolved the compatibility problem much more cost-effectively than a program of updating or redeveloping older applications for compatibility with the latest generation of browsers.

Clermont Communauté

Clermont Communauté brings together 21 municipalities based around the city of Clermont-Ferrand in the French Massif Central. As the only major urban center in the Auvergne region, Clermont Communauté plays a significant role in the regional economy and is a key university, sports and cultural focus for the region’s inhabitants. Covering an area of nearly 120 square miles, the 21 municipalities of Clermont Communauté service 283,200 residents.

The Information Systems department of Clermont Communauté manages and supports business-specific applications for the various operational departments of the community. It also acts as an IT service provider to the individual municipalities (with the exception of Clermont-Ferrand itself), which lack the resources to manage their own information systems.

Services provided include hosting, connectivity and support for email, an intranet, and a geographical information system (GIS) which is the basis of a Land Registry application used intensively by the municipalities. All services are required to support web access from any type of end-point and over any type of connection – high bandwidth is not always available in the more rural areas.

The problem

Previously Clermont Communauté relied on an SSL VPN solution from F5 Networks. However there were performance issues, with certain pages taking a long time to load or not displaying properly, and problems with support for Web 2.0 technologies such as Ajax and Java made certain applications unusable.

The solution, Virtual Browser

Virtual Browser resolves all the issues faced by Clermont Communauté, and delivers security, simplicity and performance even for users connecting over low-speed links.

The Virtual Browser solution is fully compatible with existing applications, transparently supporting Web 2.0 features.

Running on a dedicated server in the DMZ, Virtual Browser integrates seamlessly with the the existing infrastructure. The client software allowing user connection to the Virtual Browser server is easy to deploy and manage. The Virtual Browser solution puts Clermont Communauté in complete control of web-based access, from the end point device to the application server.

“The Virtual Browser solution integrates transparently with our existing infrastructure, we don’t have to make any modifications. It’s easy to use, it’s secure, and it delivers on performance.” - Patrice Rodier, Director of Information , Systems, Clermont Communauté

Why Virtual Browser

Reasons Clermont Communauté chose the Virtual Browser solution by commonIT:

• The innovative technology delivered a far superior answer to the problem of secure web access, compared with traditional solutions based on reverse proxies and SSL VPNs.

• Superior performance and ease of use for end users.

• Excellent level of reactivity and support from Virtual Browser developer commonIT during testing and validation of the project.