ITS Meeting Minutes - 3-19-2003
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General Announcements
Presented by Eric Nathan

Notes soon to be released to Computing website.
One more meeting this month on Wed. April 23 from 1 to 3 pm. in TTLC Training room.

Distance Education
Presented by Gail Evans

The DE office is currently considering impact of 4-day workweek as proposed by Chaney’s office. Dr. Evans is interested in comments from other individuals. We will look at impacts in a pro-active way and make it work without causing too much disruption. There is a potential to make tremendous savings for facility use. It is essential that our network be well maintained during those days off. There is a lot that Faculty & students can do providing computer network is up and running during those days. We may finalize off-campus schedule soon but nothing final is out yet.

We have requested 2 fees to replace the Distance Ed fee that was revoked last semester. Proposals have been made for Online course fee (any course that is 50% or more delivered online) for $40 in SCH & $25 for all off-campus course fees. This will recoup about the same as the Distance Ed fee collected. Fees from DE must be used on DE and will not be put into the general fund.

Anyone who gets questioned by students, enrollment in off campus centers & online courses should remember this is a matter of trust to the student. If students suspect that we cannot provide full program then students will never start off-campus programs. We have absolutely no indication from administration (campus or system) of cutting these programs. Please be positive about the DE program to students to not build distrust or panic on the part of the students.

We are looking at textbook problems. We will not have books available at off-campus sites however books should be ordered correctly through our bookstore. We are meeting next week on textbook issues.

Off-campus sites are not currently looking at 4-day weeks during summer. The suggestion may be made but it may be difficult to accommodate that because of other commitments off-campus units have made. Other campuses have Friday and Weekend programs that may prevent a 4-day workweek for their campus. This, however, may not effect UHD’s decision should we plan to implement this for summer.

IT Initiatives and Priorities in Institutional Planning
Presented by Erin Mayer

Erin opened up discussion to consider student and other implications of going to a 4-day summer schedule. Online students in lab could affect lab access with students not able to come in on weekends. Erin called for additional input on how switching to a 4-day work week would effect students directly in this respect. General consensus was to advertise any changes early on so that students can plan for this with possibly something posted in the schedule. Other methods of communication will also be utilized if the 4-day schedule is implemented. Late night ACL access may also be considered to assist students who are on a set schedule. Student parking and bus service may also be something that needs to be coordinated.

An Infrastructure change for moving web content from staging to production was also announced. IT has developed a process that will allow for automated web publication from staging to production web servers. This will be a greatly simplified process compared to the notification and publication system currently in place, and will incorporate a next day publication timeframe.

The Online Directory system is maintained by UHD IT. Data is being provided by Human Resources, departments, and individuals who request updates. The Project Coordinator maintains the database of online directory information (Tamara Snow, X8111).

The Faculty Senate's FY2004 planning priroities were discussed. UHD Information Technology applauded the fact that he desktop project was included in the priorities. IT has asked the Faculty Senate to consider emphasizing the the technology infrastructure projects (networks, satellite labs) and dedicated information security personnel as priorities as well.

W.I. Dykes Library
Presented by Steve Casburn

The library is seriously effected by federal student workers project funding issues. Staffing is down.

Web updates will be implemented making it easier to find resources on the site and make it more intuitive for students and other library patrons. This will include reworking help pages for both local and distance students to include more instructional information as well as general structural changes to the site.

Library instruction requests should be turned in early. Talk to Kimberly Polk for additional information.

ITV / Multimedia Services
Presented by Lloyd Matzner

ITV encourages faculty toward end of semester to pass word on to colleagues who need media carts of presentation classrooms get their reservations in ASAP. There is a high demand in last month of the semester.

Video network services has switched over to H323 IP delivery network instead of ISDN for video conferencing. There has been extensive testing with great results including improved scalability and ability to provide a greater variety of offerings & the new system will be less dependent on the UH system hub for our ITV classes.

Academic Computing Lab & User Support Services
Presented by Said Fattouh and Lucy Bowen

ACL goes into extended hours

Mar 31, 2003 - Apr 30, 2003 (Extended Hours)
Monday - Thursday 7:30 am - Midnight
Friday: 7:30 am - 8:30 pm
Saturday: 8:00 am - 6:00 pm
Sunday: 10:00 am - 9:00 pm

Migrating to Windows XP in general lab and classroom for Fall. Summer will have 1 XP test lab. Software requests should be submitted ASAP. Purchasing academic server. Development based “e-commerce” type server for backend web development classes. Partnering with CIS and COB. Shared venture between faculty and IT personnel. Fall rollout planned.

Pagemaker licenses may be shared with woodlands campus to allow students at that campus enrolled in our courses to have access to the software.

Moving forward with the desktop computing project for areas covered this year. Was put on hold until budget worked out but is now moving forward. Some areas were pushed to next year.

Upgrading McAffee virus scan to newer version (Version 7 Enterprise). Should be automatic upgrade over the next several weeks in several stages.

Evaluating e-mail spam blocking utilities and popup ad software to minimize this from an enterprise wide perspective. Some utilities are built into Outlook such as mail and junk filters but additional measures are being taken. Announcing more info as additional testing is made.

Adjunct faculty are covered for MS Office take-home installs.
Laptop options for the desktop computing project is on Planning Council list but was not approved last year but is still on unit plan as an option. Faculty who wish to have this option when their department PC is upgraded should list this on their unit plan.

Discussing security options for campus and system computer networks to coordinate with the Department of Homeland Security’s security color advisories. Getting guidance from state security office. High level of alerts may cause a brief level of internet access. Planning for those contingencies is in progress now.

 

General TTLC / Instructional Technology
Presented by Mark Henderson

Macromedia Contribute is in the initial stages of being implemented for UHD web site updates that will be a much simpler replacement for users that don’t wish to use Dreamweaver but it should be noted that this is not for Online courses, though that is being considered at a later time. Will be rolled out on an individual basis for users that update and maintain the UHD web site currently. We are working on developing material for the deployment stage of this project. This new product will greatly reduce some of issues with uploading pages to staging and may end up being more economical for the university in general. Editing features/interface in Contribute are a sub-set of Dreamweaver that look like MS Word standard editing icons. This is designed for users who do basic updates. Dreamweaver will still be supported for users who need or want a higher-level tool. Dreamweaver and Contribute are highly compatible. Distribution of license initially will only be for top-level group maintainers. Secondary rollouts will be planned for more users.