Date: June 9, 2000
To: Michael Scullard, Vice President for Administration
From: Mark Reed, Associate Vice President for Computing & Educational
Technology
Re: Annual Report for Computing Services and the Educational Communications
Center
I am delighted to provide you with this report of the past year’s accomplishments
and next year’s goals for Computing Services and the Educational Communications
Center.
This year the Academic Computing & Educational Technology committee revised
our long range plan to reflect the following goals:
- maintain and improve current services,
- improve and expand technical support for our customers
- complete, maintain and upgrade the campus network,
- build a collaborative work environment,
- enhance the University’s educational technology offerings,
- build a generalized research support capability,
- improve the University’s business systems, and
- assist the University’s reengineering efforts.
Attached are listed our accomplishments within the framework of these plan
goals. Accomplishments are listed in plain type; next steps are presented in
Italics.
There is always a tension in information technology between the "old" and
the "new". People rely on the stability and familiarity of the old
to get their work done and to accomplish on-going tasks, yet the rapid pace
of changing technology constantly beckons with new solutions to problems. The "old",
that is, keeping our systems available to our customers and running well, is
a considerable task when one considers the range and scope of our services:
- >17,000 computer accounts offered, more than half of which are active
- >4,400 residence hall network drops activated
- >100 batch production runs per night, on average
- >90,000 email messages processed per day during the semesters
- >2.1M pages of laser output printed for students in the pods
- >3,200 "deliveries" of audio-visual equipment made to classrooms
and special events
- >1,000 faculty and staff training center class attendees (by headcount)
- >90% of surveyed customers report satisfaction with the helpdesk (chart
attached)
- the entire campus IT infrastructure was reviewed and made compliant for
Y2K
Of course the "old" is not really "old"; it’s just
the familiar, but to remain current the old must be constantly leavened with
the new. Our goal is to work quietly in the background to upgrade the existing
environment to keep it current without customers' suffering any disruption.
Thus, we streamlined and double-checked our procedures for dorm room network
installations, acquired a tape robot, and upgraded the mainframe, multiple
servers, a quarter of the pod equipment, several multimedia classrooms, the
network backbone, desktop speeds in four academic buildings, much of our operating
and desktop software and a host of other resources, all to make our services
better. We tried and largely succeeded in doing so without much disruption
to (and hence, notice from) our customers.
The flip side of keeping the old quietly running along is to implement new
technologies, and the new was amply represented in our activities. This year
we’ve joined Internet 2, built a new type of classroom in the Collaboratory,
implemented the Pegasus/Oracle HR module and are making the last steps for
installing the Pegasus financial modules. We’ve also expanded our Technology
Training Center offerings, implemented a web front-end to our helpdesk system,
begun the process of moving our legacy BUSI system to the web, begun our first
video streaming project, and successfully defended the campus from the "The
Love Bug", Y2K and other horrors. We’ve also begun implementation
of our new classroom standards, modified our long-range plan, begun work on
planning for better support of research on campus, and updated our campus "Acceptable
Use Policy" for computers and networks. In partial recognition of our
individual and combined efforts and as a reflection of the quality of our people,
Yahoo listed Binghamton among the top 100 "Most Wired"
campuses this year, and Marion Taylor of our staff has won the Chancellor’s
Award for Distinguished Service!
In spite of all the positive progress, issues remain. It’s ironic that
we’ve spent years building a network that’s as open and accessible
as possible for our customers, only to have threats develop from that quarter. "The
Love Bug", frequent probes from the Internet and the exploding growth
of non-academic network traffic like Napster are all portents of things to
come. We’ll need to increase our efforts to teach our community to avoid
risky and selfish (computing) behavior, and will have to concentrate staff
and resources on areas of network security which have heretofore not been of
concern. Staffing, as always, remains a concern, where training, acquiring,
and keeping people with the personal and technical skills required of our business
remains a challenge.
We have accomplished a lot to be proud of in this past year. Given our collaborative
planning framework with the faculty and the strong support evident from the
Administration, Computing Services and Educational Communications continue
to provide substantial value in helping students, faculty and staff accomplish
their work in both the new and the old technology environments.
cc: Mary Ann Swain, Provost
LR Plan Goals |
AY ‘99-00 Accomplishments |
Provide Reliable Core
Services |
Computing
Services and the Educational Communications Center provide a broad
range of services to an ever-growing community of students, faculty
and staff who use information technology (IT). Our first priority is
to see to it that these services are dependable and reliable. Accomplishments
in this area are:
- Maintained central server and mainframe equipment (>20 machines),
student pods (>350 PCs), classrooms (> 100 general purpose and > 15
multimedia classrooms), the campus network (> 8500 drops), the campus
modem pool (> 150 lines), and all attendant applications and operating
software (thousands of copies).
- Provided basic support services to the campus community, including
pod management, residential consultants support Helpdesk, training,
PC repair and setup, network moves/changes, audio-visual and special-event
equipment delivery and setup, and documentation.
- Provided internal technical support to keep servers running, databases
functioning correctly, backups available and security active for all
central resources.
- Maintained hardware, software and supporting equipment in the multimedia
classrooms and provided for more than 3200 "deliveries" of
audio visual and other equipment for classroom and special events.
- Successfully defended the campus from "The Love Bug" and
numerous other disruptions and threats.
- Plans are to continue to maintain and improve the reliability
of current services.
|
Improve
Current Services
|
Technology
is changing rapidly, and our customers expect us to keep campus technology
close to the leading edge. To that end, CS and EdComm continually enhance
our basic services to provide our customers with the latest technology
tools. Accomplishments in this area are:
- Replaced/upgraded the central IBM mainframe (to an IBM 2003) for
a 50% increase in CPU performance while reducing maintenance and software
costs.
- Completed multi-year effort to upgrade the mainframe, NT and Sun
server operating systems, to ensure server compliance with Y2K requirements
and make available the latest features of these systems.
- Upgraded most central software packages, including SAS, SPSS, IDEAS,
Ansys, Fidap, Maple and Matlab, along with databases such as CRSP,
Compustat, ICPSR.
- Upgraded multiple software packages in the pods and improved pod
machine-restoration procedures; upgraded BUICK and the Internet Suite
for the Macintosh.
- Implemented "plug ‘n play" network connections in
residence halls, eliminating wait times for students to connect to
the network.
- Added support staff for networking, Unix support, & database
administration.
- Implemented a tape robot system to automate and speed up the process
of saving files on our (expanding) Unix and NT systems.
- Implemented redundant disk arrays and "failover" servers
to improve reliability of network servers.
- Increased modem pool size to more than 150 and acquired 56 Kbaud
modems to double the speed of our fastest modem service.
- Replaced older 3380 disks with internal RAID disk on the mainframe,
to improve speed and reliability of mainframe processing.
- Our goal remains the continuous improvement and modernization
of computing resources and facilities.
|
Build "Best Value" Support
Environment |
One
of our major goals is to provide top-flight support while keeping costs
contained and providing our customers control over the resources that
serve them. Integral to this approach is the concept of partnership,
where we collaborate with customers on needs and preferred approaches,
share support personnel, provide training and offer quick reaction
to problems. Accomplishments in this area are:
- Worked with the Academic Computing & Educational Technology advisory
committee (ACET), Classroom Environment Committee, Pod Committee, Registrar’s
Council, DARS Committee and various Pegasus working groups to provide
customer input into the formulation of our services.
- Established the "Advocacy Program", wherein 51 faculty
were visited and interviewed in detail concerning their IT needs and
experiences.
- Answered more than 10,000 calls this year at the Helpdesk, with a
satisfaction rating of more than 90% (from > 700 surveys).
- Expanded the Technology Training Center staff, served more than 1000
faculty and staff with technology training sessions, and began heavy
involvement of the TTC staff in Pegasus training.
- Completed multiple person-year effort to upgrade all center-maintained
software, upgraded mainframe and server operating systems, and reviewed
all campus PCs for Year 2000 compliance.
- Established an alliance with the SUNY Training Center, wherein SUNY
has provided 2 four-day workshops on campus for area faculty.
- Continued to provide web-development to departments on demand.
- Established a shared network position with SEHD and DSON.
- In collaboration with the ACET, redrafted the "Long-Range Information
Technology Plan", and updated the campus "Acceptable Use
Policy" [for networks and computers].
- Obtained Dell Certification to allow our repair technicians to perform
Dell on-site warranty work directly for (institutional) compensation.
- Trained the Helpdesk and TTC staffs on Pegasus modules.
- Began distributing Helpdesk "open call" reports to CS managers
on a weekly basis.
- Will work to develop an on-going, campus-wide needs survey approach
with renewed efforts at benchmarking and measuring IT services.
|
Complete, Maintain and
Upgrade the Campus Network |
The
completion and maintenance of a high-performance campus network is
critical to our plans for effective use of information technology on
campus. Accomplishments in this area are:
- Sought and won an NSF "High Performance Computing" grant
for the campus, allowing us to join NYSERNet 2000, the very high-speed
backbone network (vBNS) and the Internet 2 consortium.
- Completed rewiring of the Watson School, and extended 100 Mb/s speeds
to the desktop in four more academic buildings (WSOE, Science II, III
and IV).
- Reached record of 4400 students connected in the dorms with > 4300
of those on ethernet.
- Installed pilot equipment for ATM high-speed backbone.
- Implemented first operational wireless network on campus (in CxC)
classroom.
- Implemented pilot "fiber from the desktop" project in CS.
- Efforts this year will focus on upgrading campus wiring, completing
the connection to Internet 2, upgrading our backbone and commodity
internet capacities, while implementing a comprehensive network security
plan.
|
| Build a Collaborative Work
Environment |
As all faculty, staff
and students become connected to the campus network, they will need
a virtual collaborative work environment of common applications, automatic
workflow and shared workspace to allow them to take full advantage
of new technologies. Accomplishments in this area are:
- Expanded the availability and performance of the Microsoft Exchange
server, which now provides calendaring and common workgroup services
to some 400 faculty and staff.
- Completed testing of programs to allow automatic download and installation
of the Office 2000 suite of products.
- Distributed over 300 copies of Microsoft Office 98 to the campus
community for licensed home use.
- Provided a campus site license for anti-virus, office, and voice
recognition software.
- Efforts this year will focus on the automatic distribution of
software upgrades, workflow and the expansion of use of collaborative
software.
|
| Enhance Technology in Classrooms/Pods |
Our pods and multimedia
classrooms are critical to the students’ use of computers, to
many faculty members’ teaching efforts, and to our experimentation
efforts in the use of technology in teaching. Accomplishments in this
area are:
- Worked with Physical Facilities to begin systematic upgrade of all
general-purpose classrooms; completed 9 classrooms in Science I and
Fine Arts buildings. Also upgraded various equipment in other multimedia
classrooms.
- Developed a web-based classroom inventory whereby faculty can easily
check the equipment installed and available in any classroom.
- Provided multimedia production services for faculty and grad students
almost 1500 times in Multimedia Resource Center, and completed more
than 140 design projects for departments.
- Populated the Luminet Room with PCs to allow it to serve as a fully-functioning
training center in addition to its classroom duties.
- Upgraded the "Minipods" in Theater, Music, Art and the
Visual Resources Center; provided a web interface for the VRC.
- Expanded "Jake" system to provide more than 2.1 million
pages of laser printing in the pods to students.
- Efforts this year will be to continue the upgrade of general classrooms
to comply with CEC guidelines.
|
| Build a General Research
Support Capability |
An emerging goal of
the University is to increase the amount and quality of funded research
carried out on campus. Accomplishments in this area are:
- Collaborated with faculty from the ACET on a set of recommendations
for technology which can significantly contribute to the campus research
effort.
- Initial efforts will be to prioritize the list of recommendations
from the committee and develop a funding and implementation plan.
|
| Enhance the Institution’s
Business Systems |
The Long Range Plan
calls for ensuring Y2K compliance, upgrading our core business systems,
and moving our business systems onto the web and toward customer self-service.
Accomplishments in this area are:
- Completed the Y2K compliance conversion of more than 1200 of 3500
(then) existing individual programs. Additionally, eliminated 1400
of these programs as no longer necessary.
- Installed multiple instances of the Oracle application software for
the Pegasus project; went live with the Human Resources module and
are testing the Purchasing, Payables and GL modules in preparation
for going live.
- Acquired and installed Softouch’s "Crossplex" software,
and began a project to use Crossplex to make the BUSI system fully
web-accessible.
- Significantly upgraded the Damage Deposit system, and enhanced the
Pell process via enhancements to financial aid and student accounts
programs.
- Collaborated with departments in the selection and/or support of
applications in support of Facilities (FAMIS), ID Cards, the Library
(ex Libris), Traffic and Safety, Post Office and Access Cards.
- Implemented an Alumni web-based credit card payment option.
- Efforts this year will be to fully implement the Pegasus HR and
Financial applications, and prepare for implementation of the Pegasus
Student Information System, while at the same time expanding our
offerings of business applications on the web via Crossplex and other
products and presenting them in a comprehensive University portal.
|
| Assist the University in Reengineering Operations |
One of the value-added
functions of a technology organization is the assistance it can provide
in process redesign and the use of technology to solve business problems.
To that end, a goal of CS and EdComm is to acquire and disseminate
expertise and assistance for University reengineering projects. Accomplishments
in this area are:
- Sponsored and chaired the efforts of the Classroom Environment Committee,
which constantly reviews standards and setup specifications for classrooms
and the use of technology in classrooms.
- Conducted an internal CQI review which resulted in production of
a comprehensive student worker handbook for AV services.
- Worked with faculty to develop the Collaboratory classroom, with
its wireless network and flexible furniture setup and multimedia equipment.
- Participated with the Center for Quality in an effort to reengineer
the CS documentation process.
- Were involved in the process design and brainstorming for all major
Pegasus modules: HR, Purchasing, Accounts Payable, General Ledger and
Student Information Systems; produced specification plans for the upgrade
of DARS; redesigned the SOOT form process (reduced lead time from 2
weeks to 4 days), and provided student web access to Financial Aid
data and grades.
- Upgraded the LISTSERV program, allowing customers to manage their
own lists entirely via the web.
- Participated in the campus disaster drill, and provided taping for
the event.
- Provided support and production for the VPs’ Campus Forum event.
- Assisted on the campus "Empire Games" planning committee.
- The goal is to assist in the improvement and efficiency of University
processes where ever technology can be of help.
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