January 15, 2008

VOTING MEMBERS PRESENT:  PHILIP TURNER, CHAIR, TIM CHRISTIAN, CLAUDIA LYNCH (for ELIZABETH HINKLE-TURNER), JOHN HOOPER, JIM BYFORD (for SCOTT WINDHAM), GARY MATTHEWS, YUNFEI DU, FRANCES MAY, LOU ANN BRADLEY, WILL SENN, JON NELSON, CENGIZ CAPAN, DON GROSE NON-VOTING MEMBERS PRESENT: MAURICE LEATHERBURY, PHILIP BACZEWSKI, JOE ADAMO, SEAN-MIKEL FLOWERS, SUE ELLEN RICHEY (Recording Secretary) MEMBERS ABSENT:  NOREEN GOGGIN, BRUCE HUNTER, PATRICK PLUSCHT,  JUDITH ADKISON, ROBERT NIMOCKS,  JOHN PRICE, RAY BANKS, ABRAHAM JOHN, DONNA KEENER, RAMU MUTHIAH GUESTS PRESENT: CHARLOTTE RUSSELL

Distributed Computing Support Management Team**

Philip Baczewski reported for the Distributed Computing Support Management Team that they met on January 4, 2008.  The meeting featured a demonstration of the new IT problem reporting service for end users.  This simple web interface gathers user and problem information and creates tickets in the Remedy ITSM 7 trouble ticketing system, which are routed to the appropriate support staff.  The new system will be rolled out in coordination with the migration to the new ticketing system and will be presented via a web page that will feature searchable or browseable help information as well.  Migration is currently slated for early February.  DCSMT is next scheduled to meet on January 18.

Student Computing Planning Group 

Claudia Lynch reported for the Student Computing Planning Group that the members of the student email committee have been testing Microsoft Live at EDU and Google. Informal questionnaires have been sent out to the lab consultants to gain more input on different email systems and their uses by the students.  Other anecdotal evidence continues to be gathered from schools that have already switched to these ‘free email systems’ for their student populations. Susan Williamson of the Alumni Office has been added to the committee to provide input on alumni relations with email from these companies.

An ‘email meeting’ of the tech part of the email committee will occur this week.  A formal meeting of the entire committee will be called during the week of January 20 (after MLK Day).

Standards & Policy Planning Group

Tim Christian reported for the Standards & Policy Planning Group that he has received the Email Policy from Bonita Hairston with some suggested minor changes and is working on the corrections.

New Imaging System, Email Archiving, and Workstation Replacement 

Maurice Leatherbury reported that CITC has selected Image Now for the new Imaging system, and plan to kick off that project soon.   They need to get Image Now engaged so that they can send a consultant to help with the integration of their product with PeopleSoft.  It is hoped that it will be up and running sometime this summer, with the first user being the Registrar’s office, Student Records or Purchasing & Payment Services because they have the heaviest volume of imaging.

At the December meeting, Maurice had asked for advice about purchasing an email archiving software.  He reported to the IRC that CITC went ahead and purchased the archiving software, and got a $25,000 or $30,000 price break, but does not plan to roll it out until they are farther along on the Microsoft Exchange migration.  Maurice has attempted to contact the new UNT Compliance Officer to try and meet to get an idea of what his preferences are related to archiving.  Cengiz Capan asked if there would be a need to purchase any additional equipment/software for this purpose in the future.  Maurice replied that he was not aware of anything else they would need.

Maurice distributed a proposal for a plan for mandatory workstation replacement.  He explained that the State requires UNT to have a desktop replacement schedule and up to now he has been pointing to a very old replacement plan that has been on the books.  When he began looking at data about the age of the micro-computers on campus, it became clear that there are a lot of very old machines on campus. Maurice’s proposed plan would provide a mandatory replacement of primary workstations, for “knowledge workers,” on a cycle of 4 years, which would have an average annual cost of roughly $1,188,300.  The numbers of “knowledge workers” at UNT were determined by Human Resources, based on their definition of that group. This number would not include maintenance, housekeeping, food service employees, etc. Maurice stated that he is aware that this plan may disadvantage some departments who have already planned funds for this purpose.  Further, this plan would not address lab machines. He has discussed this with VP Andrew Harris and further planning will be needed to possibly merge an existing plan to replace faculty machines every three years. Discussion followed during which Jon Nelson noted that the College of Music faculty really do not have a need for the newest desktop computer since they only use their computers for email, and might prefer to use their HEAF funds to purchase musical instruments instead. Jon recommended that departments be allowed to decide which machines to replace.  Maurice welcomed all comments and asked members to send further comments to him by email, and all will be considered when preparing the final plan.  He also suggested that a sub-committee be formed to discuss and work through some of the issues and asked for volunteers, with Gary Matthews, Tim Christian, Cengiz Capan, and Philip Baczewski being the first to agree to serve.  Cengiz suggested that Donna Asher be invited to serve on this committee also.

Proposal for restructuring the Advisory Committees to Information Technology at UNT 

Maurice Leatherbury distributed a proposal for restructuring the Advisory Committees to Information Technology at UNT.  He explained that there is a need to re-establish the Information Resources Steering Committee.  He also wants to see this council restructured to make it more effectual.  The most controversial thing in the proposal is the suggestion to not have network managers as members of the IRC.  He believes their needs can be addressed through the Distributed Computing Support Management Team, and they can serve on the various advisory groups.  Philip Baczewski noted that there should not be an exclusion of DCSMT members serving on the IRC.  In the discussion that followed, there were a number of suggestions put forth, which Maurice said he would take into account.  Maurice stated that the next action will be to write a policy and bring it to the IRC, so he invited more comments and suggestions to be emailed to him prior to the next IRC meeting.

Since there was not a quorum present, the minutes of the December 18^th IRC meeting will be reviewed at the February meeting.

There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 3:20 pm.