Minutes - February 14, 2003
1:30-3:00 pm - I.G. Greer Room 224
Persons Present:
Ex officio members: Jeff Williams (ITS, Chair), Doug May (ACS)
Voting members: Tom Leonard (for Teresa Canton, Advancement), Beth Davison (Arts & Sciences), William (Bill) Griffin (Arts & Sciences), Greg Lovins (Business Affairs), Ed Pekarek (Arts & Sciences), Don Rankins (Registrar), Richard (Dick) Riedl (Reich College of Education).
Guests Attending: Steve Breiner (Instructional Computing, ITS, recorder), Steve Hopper (Applications Group, ITS), Charles (Mick) Kreszock (Instructional Technology Center), Michael Bennett (Reich College of Education), Douglas Brantz (Fine and Applied Arts), Mary Beth McKee (Instructional Computing Services)
1) Welcome & Introductions
Jeff Williams greeted the attendees and opened the meeting at 1:35 PM. He asked if there were any agenda items that the membership would like to add to the previously published agenda, with no responses in the affirmative. Williams asked for and was granted a consensus that the agenda be amended to accommodate schedules of one of the speakers on the agenda.
2) IT Flexibility Management Plan and Technical Directions Update
Williams noted that Appalachian had filed for approval of an IT Flexibility Management Plan with the UNC Office of the President. He explained that the plan was an IT-related analog of the overall University Budget Flexibility Management Plan for Finance in that it would preserve Appalachian’s ability to pursue its IT management strategy with a reasonable degree of flexibility. The plan is a document, targeted to top-level administration (specifically the UNC Board of Governors), that documents and requests BOG endorsement of Appalachian’s need to have a higher degree of such flexibility than is granted routinely to non-educational state agencies. He noted that the plans of five institutions in the UNC system had been approved. He noted that the ITAC membership, IT managers, Drs. Bobby Sharp and Wilber Ward had received the draft document and suggested that, until after ITAC and those persons had refined and approved it for forwarding to the provost, that it be treated as an internal draft.
Asking for comments, Dick Riedl (RCOE) asked about whether it might be reasonable to reexamine the logic under which Instructional Computing Services, Academic Computing Services, and the Instructional Technology Center perform a number of apparently overlapping services.
3) Status of Banner Human Resource System
Greg Lovins (Business Affairs) reported that the original target date (1/1/2003) for Banner HR deployment had been revised to target July 1, 2003, for full deployment. The decision to move the implementation date was made on the bases of (a) need to more fully test the system and (b) the announced May 1 retirement of Clayton Cooke, who had been spearheading the effort. Lovins reported that Pat Taylor and Richard Shook would be guiding the Banner implementation effort. Lovins also reported that the “parallel” time sheets being completed monthly by departments were assisting the efforts to insure accuracy in payroll and that the need for submitting the “parallel” entries would soon disappear, with a move to submitting exclusively the “new” time sheets. He also mentioned that, as Banner implementation proceeds, the “Web-for-Employees” application would likely simplify the process of information retrieval and perhaps, even, direct timesheet entry capability.
Williams noted that Banner Finance was the first project on the plates of the implementation group and that that group would be traveling to Virginia Polytechnic University to examine that school’s implementation of the system. Much of this process, state Williams, was to address anticipated findings by the North Carolina Governor’s Efficiency Committee, and that our current efforts are moving ahead to minimize disruption caused by the anticipated “recommendations” for changes to our practices. Williams will distribute the forthcoming recommendations as they become available.
Mick Kreszock (Instructional Technology Center - ITC) asked whether the implementation would consolidate into the Banner system some of the functions currently distributed among multiple applications. Specifically, he mentioned online purchase orders, procurement requests, and job applications. Lovins replied affirmatively, that the consolidation of such functions would be a major benefit of the new system.
Riedl asked whether Banner would obviate the need to shut down SIS and affiliated services for batch maintenance during times when certain RCOE personnel would prefer to have access. Williams responded that, although a resolution of that issue was not yet certain, there were IT infrastructure improvements being undertaken that should greatly reduce the regular need for such downtime.
4) Defining Mission Critical Applications
Williams addressed the group about a current initiative with new servers and storage systems to enhance the reliability and availability of so-called “mission critical” services. After distributing a list of those services (and systems) currently identified as such by ITS, Williams asked the group to examine the list and to identify any additional services that should be added and to identify any of those whose priority on the list should be adjusted. He explained that those services on the list rated as “level 1″ were those requiring automated restoration of service in the event of failure and other ratings with somewhat lesser requirements for rapidity of restoration.
Michael Bennett (RCOE) asked about departmental options for Storage Area Network (SAN) or Network Attached Storage (NAS) resources. Williams then presented an overview of SAN proposals that were being evaluated within ITS as part of the infrastructure improvements previously mentioned in reference to Riedl’s earlier question regarding SIS downtime and connected these efforts with the emergent disaster recovery scenarios being evaluates as part of our ongoing efforts to assure services. Williams also stated that certain existing fast storage media were being considered for use in “warm” backup operations that would significantly reduce necessary downtime for certain services.
Riedl questioned the use of the phrase “one business day” in the disaster recovery descriptions in Williams’ priority list; he was concerned that some necessary services might require restoration within 24 real-time hours, when the recovery scenario seemed to imply that a service failing at the end of a work week might not be restored for several calendar days. Williams assure Riedl that the “one business day” scenario envisioned essentially the complete destruction of the main machine room in Raley Hall as part of a true emergent disaster, and not simply loss of a service or machine - those lesser types of losses would be recovered as soon as practicable, regardless of “business days” involved. He explained further that the specific language cited was established by the NC IT Auditors as minimal standards and that Appalachian will certainly do all in its power to exceed those minima.
Don Rankins (Registrar) asked whether the AppalNET campus portal was a fully redundant service. Williams answered that it was not fully redundant at this time. Rankins mentioned that the Office of the Registrar was considering conducting a number of Business Process Analyses (BPAs) on many of the functions critical to the operation of the university, with those studies being focusing on IT schedules and service availability.
5) Other Business
Williams asked Rankins to talk a bit about the voice response registration system. Rankins mentioned that voice response usage was on the wane and that most registration activity was occurring via web tools. He anticipated that the current voice response system would be phased out to save utility costs and hardware maintenance costs on the related systems.
Kreszock reported that printer and copier services provided by the ITC were being consolidated and that a new bid request had been prepared for the hardware components of that service. One of the reasons for looking at alternatives to current suppliers is to find a vendor capable of providing an on-campus supplier of parts and supplies to prevent the long delays seen in getting same from the current printer/copier provider. He anticipates lower per-page costs by July 1 of this year as more departments buy into the central service printing/copying model. Rankins noted in example that the registrar’s public printing was being moved into the managed print services of the ITC / Pharos printing services system. Kreszock also reported that ITC and ACS were looking into Pharos printing services for office access.
6) Adjournment
There being no other business, Williams thanked those present for their participation and adjourned the meeting.
