The Challenge
Like most educational institutions today, Tamborine Mountain College relies heavily on technology, so it’s imperative for its devices to work reliably and have all applications required by the curriculum. For a time, the IT department was able to manage the college’s devices manually, but as the number of endpoints increased, the task became quite time-consuming. When COVID-19 hit and staff went remote, managing and supporting their endpoints manually became even more challenging, increasing the risk of errors and unpatched vulnerabilities. Barry Carmichael, IT Support Manager at Tamborine Mountain College, started looking for a solution that would enable him to efficiently manage and update software on all endpoints in order to improve security and ensure an uninterrupted educational process.
The Action1 Solution
The first few solutions that Barry tested were either too complex or expensive. Then he spotted Action1 and was thrilled to discover that it met all his requirements. Plus, Action1 provides valuable extra capabilities, such as remote desktop and reporting, while being easy to deploy and use.
The Benefits
Automated software deployment and removal. With Action1, the IT department at Tamborine Mountain College can seamlessly roll out specific applications to the college’s devices as required and manage updates for them. “We have to deploy new applications from time to time to support faculty and students,” says Barry. “For example, the last application we deployed was called Blender. The setup was straightforward through the console, and deployment went smoothly. The students didn’t even realize it was being installed until a desktop icon appeared.”
Streamlined patch management. Even though most staff members have returned to campus, some have not, and others still often take their devices home. With Action1, the IT team is able to easily manage patches for both remote and office-based endpoints, which saves them a lot of time as they do not have to physically handle each device. Plus, having a reliable patching process for all devices strengthens security.
With Action1, we are able to support, manage and patch our endpoints no matter where we are, via any device that has a browser. It is a brilliant product that helps us achieve all we wanted in a very cost-effective way.
High-quality IT support. The IT team regularly uses the built-in Remote Desktop to provide both remote and office-based staff and students with high-quality IT support. “We love the Remote Desktop for its ease of operation,” adds Barry. “It saves the team a lot of time and helps us support our users more effectively — especially since some of our staff members still work remotely.”
Visibility into all endpoints. Action1’s IT asset inventory feature enables the IT team to run reports on the current state of software and hardware across their entire network. It has brought us to a completely new level, as now we can keep an eye on what is installed on our devices to further enhance security and streamline our endpoint management efforts,” Barry notes.
