University Standards Committee
March 19, 1997
Meeting Minutes

Committee Members in Attendance:

Steve Keto, co-chair
Bill Willis, co-chair
Carl Allred (for Carl Malstrom)
Sam Averitt
Leo Buckmaster
Mike Freeman
Ken Hanck
Brian Kemerait
Charles Kneifel
Ron Melbourne
Angelia Smith
Dan Steen
John Ulmschneider
Eric Wiebe
Dan Willits

• Minutes were approved with a change to the minutes made by Ron Melbourne. The first sentence under #5 should read: User Authentication/DCE: Ron Melbourne informed the group that this has been put into production, and gives anyone the capability to use the Kerbros 4 and DCE authentication servers for authentication.
  
  
• New committee member Mike Freeman replaced Sandy Connolly from Textiles.
  
  
• Loretta Harper, Associate Vice Chancellor for Human Resources was a guest at the meeting to discuss problems with recruiting and retaining personnel. Problem is that the salaries offered on campus are not in-line with private industry. HR developed a list of positions that were difficult to recruit and retain and presented the list (mainly computer classes) to the Office of State Personnel which resulted in the current equity and ingrade revision opportunities. Range revisions were to be presented at the State Personnel Commission which meets monthly. The list was not presented at the past meeting but she anticipates that it will be presented at the next monthly meeting. The purpose is to address the compensation for these classes. Hopefully this will result in range revisions for those classes.
  
  It was noted that we need more flexibility in recruiting for vacant positions i.e.. Question was raised regarding recruiting the new grads from NC State. Even our entry level programmer positions require experience. Some of the grads from NC State would be the best people to hire but we can’t do so because of the requirements on these positions and our inability to be flexible. It should be taken into account that students from NC State already know our environment and would be a beneficial.
  
  It was noted that Bill Padgett is our representative to the OSP committee from the UNC CAUSE organization and he meets with them to discuss personnel and compensation issues. It was suggested that he work in conjunction with HR by providing direct feedback to Loretta’s office. Communication needs to be better. It is felt that we can accomplish more with the Office of State personnel if we have better communication and our UNC CAUSE representative could be very beneficial to us in this respect.
  
  Loretta asked for assistance from the group in addressing the issues with OSP such as equity, retaining good staff, etc. Leo Buckmaster volunteered to help and Bill Padgett and Wendy Scott were volunteered to assist in this area also.
  
  It was noted that presently it is difficult to get positions classified as intended. The current system doesn’t allow any flexibility. Departments should not have to play games to get more money. OSP analyst have certain phrases and words they look for when reclassifying positions. Departments don’t always know what OSP is looking for so perhaps HR could assist the department in this process so that the outcome of the reclassification is as intended.
  
  At present, HR doesn’t have local authority to make changes in a lot of these areas although they have doubled their authority in two years simply by repeatedly requesting to be able to do so from OSP. They will continue to try to gain full authority in these areas.
  
  Some people feel that HR staff isn’t being an advocate for us when dealing with OSP. It was noted that this is probably due to a lack of communication between the department and HR. It was suggested that HR meet with departments to improve dialog with campus.
  
  
• Data and Data Access standards committee - no report.
  
  
• User Authentication - Report is being distributed to appropriate people.
  
  
• Communication Committee reported that a meeting is planned for March 26 at 9:00 a.m. in the Faculty Senate room to update the campus on network activities and to discuss the recent reorganization in what was formerly the Computing Center. Services and rates will also be discussed. It was also noted that the campus level service agreement was completely rewritten and will be finalized and completed shortly and will be available for review and comment.
  
  NCS will be working with building liaisons to do an inventory of phone lines and identify locations that will be put in a database for use with 911. There are plans to only distribute keys (to the telephone closets) to personnel that have signed a compliance statement. Signs will also be posted in closets regarding who can move phones, etc. All telephone closet doors will be rekeyed shortly after inventory process is complete. NCS will be responsible for issuing new keys to the phone closets. It was noted that it is very important that keys be distributed at such time that the locks are rekeyed so that there is still access to the closets. Wiring closet keys will no longer fit telephone closets. Public Safety is directly involved in the final process and the telephone location information will be put into their dispatch system. Hazardous materials info will also be put into their dispatch system.
  
  
• Electronic Mail - no report.
  
  
• Target Delivery - Richard Merwin gave a presentation on CGI vs JAVA. He gave pros and cons of both and basically stated that ACS has chosen to go with HAHT HAHTsite for the delivery of CGI based database applications. He stated that ACS will continue to use CGI for delivery of information where appropriate. He stated that Java, and the tools associated with the environment, will be the mechanism for cross platform delivery of GUI based database applications. Java has been slowing moving towards GUI based development of database applications for some time and the tools will be adequate for basic applications this spring/summer. He expects Java to be used where Powerbuilder is being used today in application delivery. For more information visit the web site http://www2.acs.ncsu.edu/randd/cgijava/index.html
  
  
• IRMC & UNC-GA Information Systems - It was reported that UNC-GA information systems were chaotic due to a resignation of John Harrison. This puts the university in a difficult situation with our peer institutions. ECU is working on a proposal to take over management of super computing at MCNC. Bill Willis will ask super computer users on campus to help form an alternative proposal to ECU. Problem is that UNC GA is not paying attention to us. It was noted that we need to raise the issue with UNC CAUSE to form a coalition regarding our concerns with information systems and UNC-GA. Since Lou Parker retired there has been some concern that there isn’t a UNC CAUSE representative working in general administration.
  
  IRMC approved standard for the state to use PDF format in electronic documents (on the web). Also, all state email will be required to be MIME type within three years.
  
  It was noted that there is a proposal that went to the legislature with the highest level of priority to provide funding for year 2000 issues. Presently there is funding in the governor’s budget but it may not be enough.
  
  

Other issues raised at the meeting were as follows:

• Question raised regarding students being able to complete course evaluation on the web. At present it is a time staking process to gather all of the data and compile the results from the course evaluations. Problem is that there is no way to insist that students complete the evaluations if they were on the web. Also this would be pose a burden on the computer lab at an already peak time. Results can be compiled electronically since OPSCAN forms are already being used. The whole process should be looked at to determine the best possible method for the class evaluation process.
  
  
• It was requested that there be two special presentations at the next Standards Committee meeting: A presentation from the MIME Types Committee and a presentation on the disaster recovery plan for campus.

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