Enterprise file synchronization and sharing services for educational environments in case of disaster

Abstract

Cloud computing is an emerging solution that responds to the concept of Smart University; it aims at offering an intelligent environment of business continuity for the actors of an educational center. This research offers a recovery plan of educational services in case of disaster, through an action research, which analyzed free software for cloud computing, focusing on Enterprise File Synchronization and Sharing (EFSS). To achieve this, the implementation was placed in a local scenario (Linux Apache, MySQL, PHP, LAMP), and stress tests were performed on three applications: Nextcloud, Seafile and Pydio. Nextcloud had more consistent and better results than the other two applications; however, it lacks a system that allows synchronizing two Nextcloud instances. To solve this, we developed a routine aimed at providing an environment that monitors the hot site where the application is hosted and, from time to time, synchronize the instance to avoid data loss during disaster events. Afterwards, we configured a second application on a cold site that is alert to a possible service breakdown, so it can respond and sent immediate alerts. Finally, the usability of the routine was evaluated, and the disaster recovery plan for the EFSS was assembled, to offer a continuity of the educational services that are running in these environments.

Keywords

• business continuity
• cloud computing
• disaster recovery
• educational technology
• information technology
• open source