Twenty Urgent Issues

These are issues identified as "urgent" at the ITPG Meeting of October 6, 1998 (w/ additions).

1. Security: possible areas to address are organizing security response by operating system and reconciling the broad spectrum of protection schemes that exist on campus.
2. Directory Services: there is already a version 1 LDAP server on campus. The administrators need input from the rest of campus regarding what information and fields should be supported. A Directory Service is the building block for other campus services.
3. Planning & Funding: We need dedicated staff responsible for planning. We also need more IT resources available for classroom support and decisions on what should be centralized or decentralized. There needs to be a tremendous increase in permanent funding for permanent functions e.g., staffing, S&E, hardware renewal.
4. Creation of a unified data network group (vs. the current split NOC) which needs some level of funding.
5. Student Access to computing resources (and definition of what resources are available). What are the plans in addition to the Library Open Access systems?
6. Dial-up access to campus.
7. Umbrella organization or structure for Administrative Systems and functions: how these systems can best interface to other resources, use datawarehousing, etc.
8. UCSB participation in the UC authentication project including the determination of what protocols and site licenses are required.
9. New campus backbone planning, e.g., how will new groups join?
10. Fragmentation of Campus IT support and decision making.

Following are new issues contributed at ITPB meetings since October 1998.

1. Restrictions on the open access workstations. That is, can anyone do anything they want (e.g., play games or display sexually explicit materials) for as long as they want? There was a short discussion of experiences in various units.
2. Copyright issues, specifically, MP3 piracy and distribution.
3. Advice on handling interdisciplinary competition for resources in computing labs was requested. Lab management doesn't feel comfortable turning down some of the requests that come in, but doesn't have sufficient resources to address all of them. Perhaps an ITPG subcommittee might be formed to review current and possible allocation mechanisms and make a recommendation either to lab managers or to ITB.
4. Software License Agreements.
5. Negotiations with COX for cable modem.
6. How to address the issue in intra-building wiring in L&S. The problem is becoming acute in some units and Alan wonders how to get it on the ITB agenda. Alan will do some preliminary research for a future discussion.
7. WASC Accreditation issues: A subcommittee of the group preparing for the next accreditation review is looking into IT in graduate education. Issues such as training and tools available to graduate students as they prepare to be future teachers and scholars and how our programs compare to others in the area of preparation to support distance learning are under review. It was suggested that we make the ITB aware of the potential impact of new programs in this area on the IT infrastructure and also of the need to coordinate the IT aspects of the accreditation subcommittees with each other and with the ITPG and ITB. It was suggested that ITPG contact professors Applebaum and Church, who chair the subcommittee looking into graduate students and IT, and offer our assistance in coordination.
8. MSI and Chemistry demonstrated G.U.S., a departmental financial shadow system being written in 4D. This is one of several efforts currently underway to create new departmental financial systems. Other efforts are underway in Biology and Engineering. ICESS and Bren are also interested. Whether there might be economies of scale in coordination of these efforts was discussed. L&S, who originally created ARCS, has little interest in making a new investment in this area although the college is supporting a project to make ARCS Y2K compliant. Department needs are diverse and scalability is an issue – if the limits of 4D are surpassed, database administration may be required. The 4D product is also vulnerable to competition from Microsoft Access if that product is ported to Macintosh.
9. The need for a "fund for the common good" was introduced. The question is how to fund the software licenses in a bulk purchase that do not get resold. The campus may pay less in total for the licenses it needs, but the department that funds a bulk purchase may get stuck with unclaimed licenses. (If, for example, the list price of a license is $200 and we can buy 10 copies for $1500 the campus could save $500.However, if the department that steps up for the 10 copies resells only 8 of them at $150 each, its own copy winds up costing $300 – not much of a reward for coordinating the bulk purchase. Meanwhile, the campus saves $300 on the purchase of the 9 required copies, even if the 10th copy of the license is never used.)
10. The RUAC method of charging for IP ports based on a single usage during the year does not work to the satisfaction of everyone. One problem is that anyone can plug a computer into a subnet and generate an $11 charge for the department owning that subnet. This does not work well in places where individuals can plug in computers not known to administrators (e.g., Housing). Various techniques for polling computers or limiting rogue attachments were exchanged during the discussion. The IP-address revenue center generates about $132K per year.

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