Present: Arlene Allen, Larry Carver, Glenn Davis, William Doering, Doug Drury, Matt Dunham, Deborah Dawicki, George Gregg, Tom Lawton, Shea Lovan, Elise Meyer, Alan Moses, Linda Moskovitz, Joan Murdoch, Larry Murdock, Stan Nicholson, Fuzzy Rogers, Jamie Sonsini, Paul Valenzuela, Craig Welsh
Network Wiring Project
Last Friday the call for Network Wiring Projects was sent out to D-list with the deadline for project submission of July 31st. This memo should have reached all department heads and MSOs. When asked whether off-campus projects could be submitted, the reply was that all projects will be considered, but cost and logistics may preclude them from being funded. Sanity check: have we missed anyone? The only group that was mentioned that needed a sponsor was the natural reserves, e.g., Sedgewick ranch. The Network Wiring Project process is continuing regardless of the uncertainty of funding. Last year it was helpful during the prioritization process to divide the projects up into smaller pieces, e.g., getting an external connection to a building might be more critical than doing the inside wiring in the same building. Please consider whether your project can or should be divided up this way.
Gartner
Gartner was told that both the cost and terms of their renewal offer were unacceptable. They countered with a reduced subscription cost of $21K/year, but kept the same terms, i.e., two full access seats, one semi-full access seat, and monthly CD-ROM service. (Additional full access seats can be purchased for $7K each.) The arrangement worked out so that the campus can continue this service is that OIT will pay $14K/year and set up analyst inquiries for the campus through their one seat, plus serving the CD-ROM data, and Student Affairs will pay $7K/year for the second full-access seat. The new subscription runs for 3 years. A quick survey round the table indicated that the campus made at least 10 analyst inquiries during FY 01/02.
UCOP D-Day
June 10, 2002 was the deadline for the campus response to UCOP on several initiatives.
UCSB committed to participate in the system-wide HRIS Initiative. There are three components to this initiative:
- A Data Warehouse at Systemwide.
- PPS modifications with a web front.
Component 3) has approval issues, and if this component is selected, latecomers must accept what has already been contracted.
UCSB declined to commit to the system-wide Portal Content Management Initiative. A final product has not yet been decided by the RFP process. UCOP proposed to fund either the software license cost only, or the software license cost plus three years of maintenance. In return, participating campuses must implement a system within 12 months, and pay hardware costs, assign staff, hire consultants, etc. After consulting with various organizations and not finding a champion, UCSB could not commit.
UCSB responded to UCOP with our minimum ISP usage commitment. Our ISP usage continues to grow, although the cost per unit continues to decrease. (NB: Our costs for FY 01/02 were $260/unit and the cost for FY 02/03 will be $200/unit. A unit is the Mb/s at the 95th percentile over 5 minute increments.) We committed to increased ISP utilization and we may need to start considering use limits such as exist for ResNet.
UCSB committed to paying $140,000 over the next ten years for our participation in CalREN-2 and ONI. The commitment by all of the campuses will help UCOP secure financing for campus last mile construction costs, estimated to require an $18M loan.
Due to lack of time, a question about the various Wide Area Networking costs couldn’t be answered completely, so a full response is provided below.
CENIC operates and maintains the state education and research network CalREN-2. Our ISP connections to the commercial Internet are through CalREN-2. CalREN-2 also provides our connection to the national education and research network Abilene (Internet2). CENIC charges UCOP a fixed annual cost for connecting all the UCs to CalREN-2. The cost for our CalREN-2 connection is $140,000. Beginning FY 02/03 this $140,000 fee will pay for our connection to the ONI, with a smaller percentage going to CENIC for operating the backbone, and a larger amount being used to service the $18M Last Mile construction loan. CENIC provides a separate arrangement for the ISP connection, where our cost is currently based on our actual usage or our minimum commitment whichever is higher. We committed to a minimum of 381 units with an estimated cost of $76,200, which will be reduced by a fixed amount by Resnet for their first 10 Mb/s usage and an additional amount for their usage over 10 Mb/s. (Prior to November 2001, our ISP cost was a factor of not only our own usage, but also the usage of the other campuses, so our cost could increase even if our usage decreased.) Our cost to connect to Abilene (Internet2) includes a $20,000 fee to UCOP for the actual connection and $26,250 for membership to Internet2.
DECAF
A question regarding the status of DECAF was raised. The new focus of the group will be on data coordination. Doug Drury is discussing the issues with Eric Brody and Deborah Scott. A new charge will be presented to ITPG when ready.
IT Proposals
We have now completed the final step for this year’s IT proposal process. On June 10, 2002, Mark forwarded a memo with his recommendations to the EVC. He incorporated feedback from both the ITB and ITPG. Since the WAN proposal included annual operating expenses, we needed to make alternate arrangements to make sure that we could pay those costs for FY 02/03, so we incorporated those expenses into the Communications Service budget package. Due to a backlog in funded projects, the IBW request likewise will not be included in this fiscal year’s recommendation. As a result, we are requesting a relatively small amount for the FY 02/03, i.e., $80K in one-time funds for the authorization software, and $140K in permanent funds for the Directory, Library open access labs, and software depot funding. A copy of the memo (doc) is available online.
UCCSC
This conference is scheduled for July 28-30 at Berkeley. In the past, each campus presented a campus report. This year they are doing a “Poster Session," with each campus expected to display three posters on campus initiatives and/or projects. Elise is looking for content; please forward any suggestions to her. Some ideas included the IBW process, IT proposal process, NGB, a Virtual Mentoring Program via teleconferencing as part of the Governor’s Mentoring Program, a joint doctoral program with other campuses, and web based coursework.
Faculty Task Force
Although the taskforce has yet to be formed or to meet, a survey has been sent to all Ladder Track faculty, and there has been strong feedback that Lecturers also would like to be included. The survey is expanding, but the means to reach the Lecturers is uncertain. It was suggested that getting feedback from students who have actually used the existing web-based systems would be useful. It was also suggested that the GGSE could provide some useful feedback too. All such feedback efforts should be coordinated through the faculty task force.
Directory
Arlene reported that IS&C and IC are almost done interfacing Umail to the Directory. If a student tries to register or update via the LDAP web application they will be redirected to an Umail site. There will be a single ID for students and real time updates. It is not possible to authenticate via Umail yet.
There have been some infrastructure problems with the Sun replication code. Three servers had been running in tandem, but in the migration to 5.1, the early issues were fixed and the master conversion was complete before a 7-day time bomb went off. Replication from the master to the two replication servers was redirected back to the master, which corrupted the master data. Currently the database is running 5.1 from the master only, and will have to run in this manner until Sun can provide a solution.
Updating of the Directory content for publishing in the hardcopy campus directory got off to a late start. Communications Services sent out a letter to Phones-L on June 7, and Reilly Pollard has received a lot of feedback. Directory help registered 175 inquiries. Glenn Davis will be making a presentation to ABOG this Thursday.
Arlene discussed the security of the LDAP data. There are 3 servers and one development machine, all using WIN2K. There is little to no access to the database, with 4 superusers and encrypted passwords
Antivirus Software
Kevin Schmidt is working a consortium to purchase a campus-wide license for antivirus software from Sophos. The cost is estimated to be $30K. Prior purchases will be counted toward the total. A note will be forthcoming with the results.
Next Meetings
The next meetings are scheduled for:
- Thursday, July 25th, 10:00am-noon
- Thursday, August 15th, 10:00-11:30
- Thursday, September 12th, 10:00-11:30
The meeting location is yet to be determined.
Back to ITPG Meeting Schedule
