Committee Members in Attendance:
Steve Keto
Bill Willis
Sam Averitt
William Bayley
Robin Pasquarello
Mike Freeman
Ken Hanck
Greta Johansen
Brian Kemerait
Charles Kneifel
Carl Malstrom
Betsy Mebane
Ron Melbourne
Thomas Miller
Andy Raynor
Daniel Steen
John Ulmschneider
1. Old Business - September, 1997 minutes were approved.
2. Special Discussion (Disaster Recovery - Dennis Norris)
Presented a walk through of extensive efforts of disaster recovery project which began
approximately five years ago. Campus departments were interviewed to determine campus needs.
Recovery within 24 hours was determined to be cost prohibitive. Recovery within a week to 10
days is felt to be satisfactory for the campus. Reasons for disaster recover was felt to be vendor
payments, students registered, students’ financial aid checks, employees’ paychecks, mainframe
computer restoration and RS6000 Sybase. To date have met with Public Safety, ACS, Computer
Operations, Telecommunications, Physical Plant and Purchasing Insurance. Hardcopy manuals have
also been developed. Teams are Applications, hardware, Operations, Facilities, Administrative and
Data Base. Sequence of events in Disaster is declaration of disaster by Vice Chancellor or
Chancellor, Activation manual will be consulted, Disaster Recovery Manual and mobilization of
teams. Prime location is presently Partners I at Centennial Campus. An external designer will be
consulted with for design of an external facility that will be housed in the parking lot for phone
service, fiber and electricity for connection of trailers. BellSouth has also been consulted for
telephone lines. Trailers can accommodate 2000 square feet. The plan has currently been endorsed
by University Administration. The plan will be tested annually and was initially tested February 17,
1997 for the first time in Norcross, GA. Testing was completed within 10 hours and proved to be
quite successful. There are three sets of manuals which are housed in the ACS vault.
3. Data and Data Access Standards - Melbourne
Public records discussion was held addressing the state passed public law which was passed
approximately one year ago. Procedurally there is a request that each department establish a contact
person and forward that individual’s name to ACS. Biggest concern is how databases are handled in
academic research areas. It was pointed out that if any of this data is questionable for public
dissemination, it should be deferred to the legal office. Bill pointed out that the Attorney General is
prepared to assist with the defense of material that is felt not to be prepared for public release. This
public records law does not supersede the numerous privacy laws that exist. It was pointed out that
there is a web procedures page that exist. Any calls should be referred to Jeanie Peck.
4. User Authentication - Melbourne
Committee will produce implementation plan - Chairperson is Craig DeShong. Resource constraints
have prohibited progress of this committee - January felt to be a more realistic date.
5. Communication - Averitt/Kemerait
Moving forward in how we handle networking on campus. Sam, Carl, Charlie, Bill are presently
visiting all deans to begin to make some fundamental changes in the way budgets are handled from
primary capital expenditures to an ongoing, expense (monthly, annually, etc.). This addresses
covering the same kinds of costs, only handling them differently. To prohibit colleges, etc. from
paying large up-front charges, the plan is to charge per desktop connected at the backbone level and
Academic Computing capitalize the equipment and recover the costs from departments - this will be
done for the backbone. Colleges can take this to another level and allow costs to be inclusive of
wiring in closets, etc. This is an option at this point but would be more feasible as an across the
board requirement. Engineering has already indicated their desire to choose this alternative. A status
report on this will be given by Sam Averitt and Brian Kemerait at the University Standards January
meeting.
6. Electronic mail - Kneifel
Two different IMAP servers are up and running for testing. Volunteer departments will be sought in
February. Currently doing upwards of 300,000 POP server/day. In the process of writing a white
paper on addressing post master responsiveness, distribution, mechanisms, etc. Input into this white
paper will be solicited from committee members prior to the January meeting. Brian Kemerait will
work with Charlie on this. There is an Internet II workshop February 13 for faculty - background
info on Giganet activities, developments and regional and national efforts.
7. IRMC & UNC-GA information systems committee updates - Willis
To-date UNC-GA committees have not met. IRMC is significantly dealing with Year 2000 issues.
Also moving towards a statewide email specification which will not directly effect NC State
University.
8. Other - committee members
Ron Melbourne - discussed impact of PeopleSoft Human Resource and Financial systems on campus
relative to workstation requirements. Windows NT and Windows 95 servers are the only real
platforms that are supported. A handout addressing the minimum system requirements for use of
either system was distributed. Deans, Directors and Department Heads will be notified of these
requirements in the near future. It was pointed out that these applications will visible on campus
within the next six to eight months. The HR system has to be functional by January, 1999 to
circumvent Year 2000 issues. The Financial system time line has not be established at this point.
PICS, PPPC and APPS will be replaced by these systems. EPICS and Contracts and Grants JV
systems in Engineering will experience high impact from these systems. Paula Tate should be
contacted for functional concerns of the financials package. Rolf Grandstaff should be contacted for
functional concerns on the Human Resources package. A technical presentation of the PeopleSoft
systems will be presented at the March meeting.
The next meeting is scheduled for January 21, 1998.