MEMBERS PRESENT: Craig Berry, Paul Hons, Tim Christian, Chris
Strauss, Maurice Leatherbury (Chair), Ginger Boone, Jim Curry,
Dallas Newell, Kelly Wood, Richard Harris, Ken Moffett (for
Cyndie Harris), Rich Anderson, Sue Ellen Richey (Recording
Secretary)
MEMBERS ABSENT: Eric DuChemin, Mike Hatch, Robert Pierce, Abraham
John, Bill Buntain, Cengiz Capan
The minutes of the February 7, 1997 meeting were approved as
published.
Jim Curry said that there was no report from the Call Tracking
System Subcommittee; however, he did state that two areas have
asked to use the Microcomputer Maintenance Shop's system in the
interim. He is planning to call a meeting of the
subcommittee.
Maurice announced that Mike Hatch has accepted the position in
COBA replacing Phillip Chukwuma so has resigned as chair of the
Desktop Operating System Subcommittee.
Maurice introduced the subject of Year 2000 problems and issues
as they relate to distributed computing support. Richard Harris
explained that the Computing Center has been focusing on Year
2000 issues as they relate to mainframe computing, and he thought
that this committee should take some time to look at this issue
to be sure that PC-based computing is prepared for this. It was
noted that some of the database applications would need to be
updated to accept a four-digit year; and network managers should
look at other specific applications used in their areas in case
they need to be converted. Jim Curry pointed out that the only
PC's that are compliant with the Year 2000 change-over are
Pentiums and MACs. Richard stated that since the equipment
upgrade plan has been approved, there will probably not be very
many older PC's on campus by the year 2000.
Maurice said that Bill Buntain could not be at today's meeting,
so there was no official report concerning dial-up access and
connectivity issues; however, Maurice reported that some problems
with the Internet link to Dallas, and timing synchronization
problems between UNTs router and one in Dallas have been fixed.
He noted that there seem to be problems along the entire Internet
system. Maurice also announced that the Sun web server is having
problems, possibly due to a saturated switch. They are working on
a solution.
Jim Curry brought up the subject of notification of the
distributed computing support areas whenever there is an outage.
Everyone agreed that some procedure for notification should be
developed and implemented as soon as possible. Maurice said he
would work with Chris Strauss to establish such a
procedure.
Richard Harris announced that there is a new Computer Systems
Manager position available in the Network & Microcomputer
Support area of the Computing Center. The position will serve as
a team leader and will be a very technical position that can play
a proactive role in solving problems of outages as they
occur.
Richard also commented that there have been some problems
reported regarding the interchangeability of Word 6.0 and
WordPerfect 6.1. The group discussed some possible remedies
.
Tim Christian reported that Arts & Sciences has rolled out
200 new computers, so they are about half-way through the
process. They have run into some unusual problems, and there have
been some complaints from users, but Tim said that in spite of
this they are continuing the upgrade process. They hope to be
back to normal after March. Discussion continued regarding remote
access to GroupWise and Richard said he would work with Tim if he
wanted to give access to some A&S faculty.
Richard also reported that he has been waiting for a diskette
from Novell which will enable the hook-up of the new Netscape
Commerce Server and the Novell SMTP gateway, which together will
provide a reliable Internet gateway plus good secure web
access.
Craig Berry said his main problem lately has been to provide
GroupWise on Macintosh machines but reported that he has received
updates from Apple and Novell that have made that possible. Craig
said he has been working with Randy Galloway on this
problem.
Paul Hons said he plans to do training on Windows 95 next week
and the week following will do the first group of conversions. He
is using GHOST and feels confident that the first group of
conversions will go well.
Jim Curry said MMS is currently working on upgrades to Pentiums
for the College of Business.
Ken Moffett reported that Physical Plant has lost four full-time
people in the last three months; however, they are not having any
computer-related problems at the present time.
Kelly Wood of MUSIC reported that they have a full staff now and
are still working on the split from SCS in order to become fully
self-sufficient. They have completed the server upgrade with help
from the NDS team. Their next big project will be to create a
Windows volume and are planning their Windows 95 upgrade which
they will do in late July or early August. They plan to do a
Windows 95 test group right after Spring Break.
Chris Strauss reported that they have been busy making changes to
their Web Site, making all of the old URLs point to the new site.
He suggested that everyone browse around the site and see all of
the information available.
Ginger reported that she is continuing to install Windows 95 on
machines in her area. Her biggest problem is the user learning
curve in beginning to use Office 97 products. Ginger asked if
anyone had a set of procedures for checking out laptops. Maurice
told her about a Property Custody Receipt that Property &
Inventory requires for checking out any UNT-owned equipment. Paul
Hons said they use a special form, attached to the Property
Custody Receipt, so that the person checking out the equipment
knows what all is included and can make sure everything is
returned when they bring it back.
Maurice reported having a problem with disk swap space shortage
which prompted a message in Windows 95 indicating a shortage of
memory. The message was misleading. Chris Strauss suggested
installing Norton Utilities for Windows 95 or the Plus Pack to
solve that problem.
In response to a question about licensing for Office 97, Chris
said that he thinks that when D.I.R. publishes their next price
list that Office 97 will be the same price from them as Office 95
is now. Hopefully, even before that happens, Mike Wright will
have a contract in place with a "Select" vendor to
provide a site license. Richard Harris said he would talk with
the people at D.I.R. about the fact that the Computing Center can
get a lower price from a vendor directly than through them.
Maurice announced that Duane Gustavus in ACS Unix support has
resigned, so the Computing Center will have a position posted
soon.
There being no other business, the meeting was adjourned at 3:15
p.m.
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Page last modified on May 05, 1997 by Philip Baczewski