| | German Air Traffic Control
The responsibility of the German Air Traffic Control (GATC) is to make sure that the traffic in German air space operates safely, correctly, and smoothly. It is also jointly responsible for the punctuality of flights and has to ensure that air traffic flows are dealt with in a smooth and economical manner.
GATC has introduced a new communication procedure for its air traffic controllers: the "digital intercom." This project makes great demands on the reliability of the WAN and LAN connections which have been set up for the purpose, and requires backup connections, which, in case of a failure of the primary connection, must be up and running within five seconds.
So far two regional control centers have been equipped with the new digital intercom systems: the center Nord in Bremen and the center Mitte in Langen near Frankfurt/Main. Beside the two centers, the control towers of Frankfurt, Stuttgart and Hamburg, Bremen, and Nuremberg airports have totally been converted to the new digital intercom system.
As part of the new digital intercom system, there are always two PCs up and running in each control tower as well as in the central control tower. WhatsUp Gold is used to monitor all the PCs in the system. Devices that are no longer responding turn red after four consecutive unanswered pollings. Devices responding correctly are displayed in green. Those which have not responded to one polling are displayed in light green and those which have already missed two or three pollings are shown in yellow. To avoid a display featuring too many colors or one with continuously changing colors, German Air Traffic Control has configured WhatsUp Gold so that yellow means "running" and red means "not responding."
According to Stephan Möller, project manager, WhatsUp Gold s biggest asset is the excellent price/performance ratio it offers and the fact that it is easy to install and configure. The software can be installed and set-up in a few minutes without prior examination of the manual.
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