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How Would You Design Your Dream Office?
An anonymous reader writes "My company is building a new office. As the local IT Guy, I've been asked to design my new office from the ground up. If you were given the opportunity to design your dream office, what features would you include? What things would you try to avoid? I get to determine absolutely everything. The catch? I have to share my office space with all the network equipment. Just 4 standard racks, and all your basic telephone and network wiring. Can anyone help me get started? I have no idea where to even begin."
The best pair of noise canceling headphones you can find. 4 racks of equipment in your office? I'd go bonkers in about a day.
If you have to share a room with the network and phone equipment, the first thing is probably a top notch AC, followed closely by noise-canceling headphones and a new job.
If you're sharing space with network and server equipment, you need to make sure that there is some sort of sound barrier between the equipment area and your working area. Otherwise you will go nuts.
Also make sure there's lots of A/C ducting near the equipment, it generates a lot of heat.
This is a sig. It is like every other sig in the world, except that it is mine, and it is different.
How much expansion do you see in the future for your network equipment?
I know I hate it when my office has to be torn down because the budgeting people never foresaw the growth we'd see. So they wouldn't put in the circuitry for the future. And when the future arrived, the walls had to come down for the power and networking to be installed all over again.
My mom says I'm cool.
@home
love is just extroverted narcissism
I do IT for a public school system, and we do a lot of moving workstations and other equipment in and out and to seven other buildings around town. Our office is in an older building which may be closed soon, so we have been thinking of these questions. Of course what we focus on is the shortcomings of our current space...
One essential is either to be near an elevator or on the ground floor. We also should be near a loading dock.
Ideally we would have several kinds of space near each other and on ther same floor, but separate. We need an office space where we can meet with people we serve and where we can work at our workstations with some isolation from the separate space where noisy servers and cooling equipment reside. We need a workspace where we can do mechanical work and clean workstations -- we'll be using an air compressor and vacuum cleaner to clean the dust out of machines, so we need soundproofing from the office space and we need some kind exhaust system that can collect the dust. We need storage space nearby, both for new parts and for old equipment to be scavenged.
Natural light is nice, and in our climate (New England) natural ventilation is an option more pleasant than artificial air conditioning in much or the year.
Don't share the office space with the network equipment. Required environmental conditions are different for equipment from those for humans. Basically, it appears you have been told by your managers that you won't have an office/cubicle. You have been asked to use server room/data center/it-lab/whatever while them and the others get to have their own personal office space. If you don't have a choice, you should get yourself winter outfits and nice big noise-canceling headphones. Well.. a mountaineering outfit or Santa's outfit should also work well.
Exactly you can't work in the same room as servers and network equipment an IT Department in an office needs ideally three areas.
1. Server room. So cold that you need to add two layers of clothing when you go in. It should have tiled and raised floors and separate AC power circuit.
2. Secure storage area, your server room is not a dumping ground for unused hardware, boxes of wires, software and whatever else that has a plug.
3. Work area, in addition to a desk with triple screen linked to a kvm for your desktop and laptop you need a work surface on which you can do hardware repair and configuration.
Ahhh...the 'it's a joke' modifier...
...nope, it still doesn't work.
doesn't work for Ann Coulter...sure as hell won't work with you and your apparent latent homosexuality...oh, I'm just joking...
First of all, consider the safety aspects. If you're going to be the only human being in there, either by design or because any other team members will be absent for any length of time, what will you do if there's a fire in one of the racks, or an electrical accident?
Just installing fire-supression is more cure than prevention and it doesn't stop you getting injured if the fire is between you and the exit.
If you're surrounded by electrical equipment, I would hope you company would enforce a ban on liquids (coffee etc.) in the room. If they don't do this from the outset, they will as soon asn health and safety get sight of theplan - or someone spills a drink over the equipment. How will you deal with that?
Finally, expect that over time, more and more equipment will get moved into the room and it will encroach on your "office" space. Where will you personally draw the line? When it becomes a general store room? When the cleaner starts leaving their buckets on your desk?
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Ideally, you'd have a ton of cash, plenty of time and space, and clear constraints from your management about growth and uptime. Of course, if any business operated like that, they'd be bankrupt already, so you'll probably get a small stipend for construction and move-in, no idea how many people you'll have to support, and a tiny little chunk in the middle of the building for your new digs.
Once you get what info you can, I'd suggest creating a list of priorities addressing the following issues:
Once you have the server portion of your office set up, I'd look for ways to make yourself comfortable. This is where it gets way more personal, but consider how many people will be on your staff, how much equipment you'll need, a workbench, network monitoring display (and sound system for switching over to movie mode), and always remember to FACE THE DOOR with your monitor in front of you... it's good feng shui, and your boss won't see when you're playing poker online.
Good luck, and have fun!
Cheers!
1) Separate your work area from the racks with a wall.
I would even go further. See if they will allow two doors into the hallway. If they will, then simply make two completely seperate rooms.
Better, make sure there is no line of sight from the door to your desk. That way no-one can see if you're sitting behind it without coming into the room.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Don't forget to check out OSHA rules (assuming you're in the US - if not, s/OSHA/your local occupational health authority/) regarding noise levels. Depending on how much crap you have, it may make cross the limit for an unprotected workplace environment - which will either lead to you getting an office in another room (good outcome), or you getting your ass fired (bad outcome).
Cue The Sun...
It's mundane, but you can never have too many electrical outlets. Install lots of them, at different levels so you always have one accessible.
...is another man's IT Kingdom.
Firstly, with that huge amount of rack equipment, you'll need to either separate yourself from it with a wall, or you'll freeze from the constant A/C that is required and go nuts from the noise as previously stated.
For the more mundane details:
- Cable Management. Try to build the room with cable management in mind. Where do the cables go? I wouldn't mention this if you hadn't mentioned the racks. It sounds like you're building a server room that you're going to put your primary machine in. That's great and all, but that's also still "The Server Room" and not "An Office" with carpet and quiet.
- Power sources. Off the ground, preferably over your head.
- Different colored cabling. The more precise you can get this, the easier it is to find/test/figure out problems. "The web servers are on the green cabling and the file server on red" is one of the most appreciated phrases ever when things go wrong.
- Room to grow. You've grown this much so far. In five years you're going to have more machines in there. Can you handle it and still have "your side"?
- Has your management taken into account the noise factor?
- Monitor arm. Now you can install one of these! I heard these were sweet and I think it'd be really cool (dream, right?)
- Fire protection system. Being in the vicinity of those servers will probably put you very close to their fire protection. Have you thought about what systems you want to keep them safe?
- What about Water protection, if that's a consideration?
- RJ11 and RJ45 jacks. Put jacks everywhere, even if they're not being used. You can never have too many jacks or wires run.
- Filing cabinets, shelving, etc. Just wanted to mention that.
- Build a floor plan in a flowcharting program. Map out EVERYTHING. Where you want everything to go and everything to face. (Face the door as someone said earlier). There are plenty of neato Web 2.0 flowcharting programs, or just download a demo copy of Visio or something (if you have a mac, use OmniGraffle -- and for that matter, use it every day for all sorts of things, that program rules!)
- Media storage cabinet. You may want to look into something like this if you're keeping track of server backups, etc.
That's all I can think of at the moment.
6) a fifth and sixth rack, or at least the space to put them. Seriously, plan to grow anywhere from 25-50% over the next five years unless you have reason to believe otherwise. This was hinted at in item 3, but warrants clarification/repeating.
Oh, was that my outside voice?
Completely agree with the reply. You'd definitely want to separate your office space from the server room. Beyond just the noise, you want to make sure that your hardware will provide the longest life with the highest availability and reliability so you'll have as few headaches as possible.
Server room-
Make sure:
1. You check the documentation for your equipment and racks. It'll tell you how much of the following would be required for each rack or piece of hardware:
-power/current required
-heat produced
-cooling required
-room temperature requirements (generally 70-74 degrees F depending on the documentation)
-room humidity requirements (generally 40-45% depending on the documentation)
-whether anything needs to be cooled from front to back or bottom to top and recommendations/requirements to achieve optimal functionality.
Some of the vendor websites will provide power calculators that extrapolate this information for you. You also need to provision for growth and max capacity for the room as far as how much power can cooling you can provide if you were to max out that room. Some of this might be moot because they may just build out into your office space and move you to another desk if they run out of server room space.
2. Rack layout within the room so that they're not blowing hot air into each other and the harder challenge of ensuring each rack and server within each rack is getting the required cooling to stay at the appropriate temperature and humidity.
3. Cable layout and labeling - While you'll only have four racks, the cabling is no small feat. You want to make sure you have space to cable and that the cabling is protected and supported from being damaged or broken. Can happen with fibre channel and infiniband.
4. Console/KVM/Lights out management capabilities so that you can work even if some of your infrastructure is down and you are remote. Factoring that in now will save you in headaches in the future.
5. Space to pull out your equipment and service it without running out of space or bumping into other equipment. Lighting or a good flashlight becomes important here (although air blowing into your eyes or contacts doesn't help figure out what cable you're trying to remove).
6. Badge access restrictions to get to the server room.
7. A really good, high-quality phone in case you need to call coworkers or support. Crappy phones in the server room are annoying to both parties.
Office space:
This kind of depends on what you would need:
1. A good desk, and a comfy chair, basic office supplies.
2. Workbench for any troubleshooting or staging so you can stay out of the server room as much as possible.
3. Any tools, meters, cables, connectors, gender changers, etc. Even if you don't need it, always handy to have a backup in case the guy that does need it doesn't have it.
4. Face the door but also make sure the screen isn't going to be hit by sunlight if your office space has some windows.
5. Space, connectivity, and network printers for visitors like interns, coworkers or management so that you don't have to share your stuff.
6. Possibly a backup server that can serve as a personal/test provisioning (ghost, jumpstart, kickstart), file and backup server. May be unnecessary depending on what you have in those four racks.
7. Space to unpack equipment if you're right next to the server room.
8. A wide door and a wide pathway to your loading dock.
9. Any other office equipment you don't have other places in your office i.e. fax, copier, etc.
There's probably other stuff that I can't think of right now as well.
Good Luck!
The big ones: Separate space for the racks (so you don't go deaf, don't freeze, don't get driven nuts by the blinking lights and don't suffocate when the fire suppression kicks in), room to grow, storage space have all been covered.
The simpler ones that can still make all the difference however:
As much monitor real estate as possible. IT guys are usually expected to multitask to an insane degree: fix someone's network access, get someone's email back on line, figure out why a server keeps crashing, etc. Trying to do that on one 1280x1024 monitor is masochistic. 1920x1200 24 inch monitors start below $400 now. A pair of 2560x1600 30 inch monitors sounds expensive at $2k until you figure what a miniscule part of a full IT closet that'll really be.
Whiteboards. Cover as much space as you can with them. Jokingly: When people ask you to explain why you spent so much money, you can do lots of impressive looking diagrams. Seriously: Because they're still a great way of communicating ideas.
An iPod touch. Add really simple web interfaces for many of your common tasks (albeit not the security critical ones) and you can now restart servers, reset passwords, all of the day to day drivel, from anywhere within range of the office WiFi. That reduces the number of times you have to ask to use someone's keyboard while you're helping them out (reducing the uncomfortable moments where they've got things they don't want you to see on the desktop or you have to touch their sticky keyboard). It also makes meetings more productive as, rude as it is, you can keep an eye on help requests and fix a lot of things without having to wait/step out. Why the touch rather than iPhone? Simple. It stops working once you're out of range of the network. Thus work stops following you lunch and home.
Backup. Yes, I know everyone'll laugh at me for daring to point this one out. The thing is, most small companies (and being a lone IT guy makes it sounds like that might well be your case) tend to have skimped in the past. One of the areas they'll have skimped on is likely backing things up. No, a RAID array in the newest server doesn't count. Having some means of being able to get back to somewhere close to where you were before the tornado/tsunami/earthquake/senior driver/fire knocked out the whole room is essential. That means having a means to write things to a media that can be stored off site.
A decent phone with a decent headset. If you're getting tech support calls all the time, you want to be able to use a computer to fix their issues while talking - trying to balance a phone on your shoulder isn't condusive to that.
Your own printer. Tech guys seem to generate more dead trees than almost anyone else. Having to walk halfway across the office, only to find someone from marketing is printing an entire book, is a great productivity killer. A cheap laser printer will barely make a dent in a budget and will save you a ton of time.
And finally, in complete contradiction to many of the other posters: A big glass window, a desk near the door, and lots of visibility. There's a reason IT guys are hated: we are antisocial bastards who act like every interaction with every other member of the organization is a trial that's beneath us. If you'd like respect, earn it. If you want people to think you live in your fortress of solitude and judge them, do that. If you'd like them to see you as a hardworker with nothing to hide, show them that instead.
My big ticket item
a nearby desk in the main office just like everyone else.
sure yours will have lots of screens, but you still get to be one of the team.
Stop locking yourself away as the weird IT guy.
Also makes it easier to get another person on board, as the need arises.
"Call us when the New age is old enough to drink" Beck
Why doesnt anyone mention the actual space constraints?
What I find VERY important is the depth of the desk I am sitting at. It has to be at least 3ft deep - preferrably 4ft so that I can extend monitors as far away from my eyes
as possible.
Idealy this desk will be a U, if not then an L. The edges should be round so you can keep your hands on it for long time without anything being sore/squished.
With this in mind your office has to be at least 10x10ft. So starting from my preferred desk size I designed mine to be about 10ft*16ft and put 2 desks just in case I hve to bring someone over so they can sit on that extra desk doing their own business.
In addition to that I have CAT5 running to custom Leviton outlets (home depot) delivering 2 CAT5 jacks plus 2 phone jacks in each of the outlets. I used to put 2 phone + 4 network but found most of CAT5 are unused and running cables is a bit more costly than getting a 5-port hub where needed.
So I would really suggest to actually start with the desk size where you can extend your legs if needed, have the monitor where you want to see it and then think of the rest.
This one is absolutely correct, and I would also add - Don't have your back to a Window either! My desk is next to a window (sideways facing) and I can look out and into the offices of a bank across the parking lot. With a good pair of binoculars, I bet I would be able to easily make out the text on the dozens of monitors I can see.
Space is critical. You need space to put inactive equipment (spare components, tools, cables, servers being worked on, etc.) And make sure you can *reach* everything in the cabinets that you need to, and your cables are long enough that you don't have to spaghetti wire them. And whether they admit it, bureaucrats automatically associate space with power: having enough space for a decent desk will help get them to take you more seriously, and having it cluttered with equipment will not.
Cabinet space nearby for the software licenses, backup tapes, CD's and software boxes is vital. So is a place to meet with people while you fix their laptop, along with whatever network ports on different LAN's or wireless access points you need to plug directly into them and debug. A safe place to put your coffee mug is useful, and a place to put *THEIR* coffee cup and folder of paperwork while you meet them is even more vital, or they're going to put their cups on your servers being repaired and they *will* spill.
Cabinet doors that open enough to let you use the slide-out KVM consoles, remove the servers, but close well enough to reduce the noise are going to be really helpful. So is cooling that keeps you from baking with the servers, and doesn't chill you to the bone, or you're going to need a parka when you're working.
Good 3-ring binders and shelf space to put the CD's and their license literature will help you keep things organized.
Sliding glass door. Seriously. Good ones will block almost all of the sound, and management will still see it as one room, not two. As little as you really need to, you can still keep an eye on the equipment. I've seen this done once to great effect.
This also will keep you from freezing to death because of the AC.
(And do make sure it has good AC. Those servers will thank you.)
I won't join Slashcott. OTOH, If Beta goes live, I just won't be back until it's fixed. Sorry Dice.
Your comments
1) You want a serve room to hold 4 racks.
2) You want to place your 'office' alongside the server room
Assumptions
3) a Rack occupies a space 1m wide x 1m deep x 2m tall (some racks are 800mm x 800mm - it depends on the rack).
4) a rack needs a floor void below it and should have a gap between itself and the ceiling tiles of 0.5m)
Comments
a) You need to allow for expansion so commit for 1 extra rack in your plan.
this take the floor space to a minimum of 1m x 5m.
b) You should allow a 1 m walkway on all four sides!
firstly you want to get into all the front/back of a cabinet plus both ends.
so this takes the minimum to a 3m x 7m space.
if a fire breaks out half way along your exit route on one side you want an escape route the other way round.
c) You need space at one end for
- air conditioning unit
- floor standing UPS and Batteries (don't forget the battery package is going to be potentially large).
- a master power switch and a breaker switch.
each of the 30A twist-lock sockets needs a separate breaker.
depending on your power requirements you should allow for at two twist-lock ( IEC_60309 or similar) sockets per cab.
I would suggest a bay no less than 4m wide by 2m deep at one end of the room.
d) floor height & entryway
- access
most office space has a quite low raised flooring void. This is sufficient for normal power/data wiring.
however for comms rooms its a good idea to DOUBLE this void height.
Allow space for the LARGEST item to go through your doors. That may mean a FULL HEIGHT doorway,
the door may be a double or single+flap wide.
allow a RAMP not a step from your normal floorspace into the comms room.
- raised flooring suspension
allow for extra 'pillars' in the comms room to cope with the weight, especially for the UPS and COOLING.
- data cabling routes
allow for two routes IN/OUT of the room and establish a primary and secondary route. make that the fibre
loops go in one route and out the other. Allow for slack length on all cables.
- comms room security.
establish a WHO NEEDS to access this room list.
Security, Health & Safety / Fire Wardens, Compliance, IT
mandate an exclusion for everyone but IT when unaccompanied. Get the backing of the Directors & HR to control it.
use a security system to exclude unauthorised access and restrict dissemination of the ID codes.
e) Montitoring
consider an environmental monitor (APC have a range of 'wallbots / rackbot' equipment).
add a monitor to your COOLING and UPS to alert you of major failures.
f) Fire suppression
options are
GAS - expensive and takes up extra space. requires a sealed environment and separate maintenance.
WATER - from the normal sprinkler systems. wrecks your equipement.
if you're going the water route then ensure your sprinkler heads have CAGES of heavy mesh put around
each head and secured to the ceiling tiles. Then when you hit one with a ladder you don't have a wet-room.
g) Lighting.
make sure the lighting guys put the lights over the walk-routes and not over the cabinets.
yes I've seen this done.
h) Power requirements
feed a manufacturer with your equipment list and get them to run up the quote.
make sure you give them an autonomy time that is realistic.
does your new site have a backup power (deisel generator ?) that cuts
--- This meme is memory intensive
Many of these have been stated already, but here's my list:
Server Room area:
Anti-static "false" flooring (whatever it is called, that allows the floor to "breathe" and circulate air.
Wire trays hanging from the ceiling to manage cables.
Twice as much dedicated power as you'll ever need.
Dedicated AC unit for the server room.
Four-post server racks (no need for panels if the room is secured)
Preferrably a glass wall between the server equipment and yourself.
color-coded Cat5
Room to grow (an extra rack or two)
Room to walk around with a new server
A small table
Office:
Desk
Computer
Phone
Comfortable Chair
Comfortable Keyboard/Mouse
Plenty of Filing Cabinets and shelves
Workbench with plenty of network cables, power, non-digital KVM, etc. (I can't stand digital KVM's that don't get detected at startup unless the focus is on the computer during boot.)
Good speakers
A nice soundproof door that cannot be permanently unlocked. (to prevent you from accidentally leaving the server room vulnerable.
At least one wall to hang posters, comics, calendars, etc.
A dry-erase board if you are into that sort of thing.
Legroom
And of course a storage closet. You WILL get way too much stuff when other people decide they don't want it, and they don't want to wait for the recycler to come pick it up.
The comfort items seem silly to a boss at times, but they make a world of difference when it comes to how much stress you can handle.
My office is one out of the three cubicles in my room, and a portion of the slanted, non-air-conditioned closet with water-based fire prevention is my "server room" that houses a single rack. The rest of the servers are on a desk in the storage closet, under my desk, or next to the Web Team's desk. ALWAYS plan-ahead, don't just "Get it done", or you'll wind up with fully soaked servers and people turning off servers that they think are just normal computers.
"Now the trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you very often succeed." -C.S. Lewis
Using a well designed ticketing system improves efficiency and service levels, both of which lead to happy internal customers.Making best use of the assets and resources the company makes available isn't serving the company? Managing the environment to promote efficiency isn't serving the company?
Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.