CSE Computer Committee

• Faculty
  • Rick Parent (chair)
  • Roger Crawfis
  • Hakan Ferhatosmanoglu
  • Dhabaleswar Panda
  • Han-Wei Shen
  • DeLiang Wang
• Staff
  • Mike Compton
• Student representatives
  • Grad Rep: Venu Madhav Satuluri
  • UGrad Rep:

• May 29
  • In attendance:
    • Staff: Mike, Dave, Shaun
    • Faculty: Rick, Leon, DK, Han-Wei
    • Student Rep: Venu
  • we went over budget for computing support, mainly to review big ticket items:
    • network - big thing next summer
    • 2 air conditioners
    • suggested a multi-year plan for all big ticket items be prepared
• May 22
  • In attendance:
    • Staff: Dave, Shaun
    • Faculty: Rick, Leon, Han-Wei, Hakan
    • Student Rep: Venu
  • We met to respond to external review report the only comment was that computing support was well-run - so we have no action to take
• Jan. 31, 2008
  
  • In attendance:
    • Staff: Mike C., Dave K., Shaun R.
    • Faculty: Hakan, Leon, DK, Gagan, Rick, Roger
    • Student Rep: Venu
    • Other: Carrie, Don
  • Action Item: Earnings account
    OSURF has disallowed our model for charging NSF grants 5% for 'computer services.' The Committee discussed how to establish a more justifiable charge for services rendered that would: produce about the same monies, be acceptable by NSF and OSURF, be easy to administer, be (more or less) fair. Much discussion ensued. We decided to tie the service to the FTE of researchers (GRA, faculty, post-docs) involved in the grant. With the help of Don, Carrie and the computing staff, we will come up with corresponding services and charges to make into a proposal to be brought to the full faculty.
• Jan. 24, 2008
  
  • In attendance:
    • Staff: Mike C., Dave K., Shaun R.
    • Faculty: Hakan, Leon, DK, Han-Wei, Rick P.
    • Student Rep: Venu Satuluri
  • Information item: PC Installation
    

    New machines are in the labs, and TA offices running XP
    faculty office machines will be installed 1 by 1 running  vista
    by default - faculty and staff will not have admin privileges - but 
      anyone can petition to get admin privilege
    The main office staff will not have admin privileges
    

  • Information item: Security
    

    The staff has prepared a draft of the procedures they will follow to
    become compliant. This will be submitted to the College
    

  • Information and Action Item: new Earnings account charges

    The staff has produced a new draft of the earnings account charges.
    We (Mike C., Rick P., Leon and anyone else interested) will meet 
      with Carrie to get her perspecitve on OSURF's perspective. 
    Then, after appropriate modifying the earnings account draft,  we 
      will meet with OSURF.
    Then we will bring a proposal to the full faculty once we have confidence 
      that it satisfies OSURF's concerns.
    

• Nov. 14, 2007
  In attendance
  staff: Mike C., Dave K.
  faculty: Roger Crawfis, Rick Parent, Hakan Ferhatosmanoglu, Han-Wei Shen
  students: Matt
  topics:
  • we need to have a minimum level of service for all research workstations (as opposed to making them 'dead in the water' so to speak). there are 2 justifications: 1) information security 2) grad student funding plus, an unfunded research still needs to be able to do research need: on the net with updates
  • we need to try to maintain computing staff funding levels similar to what we've had before
  • need to charge for equipment space on 8th floor
  • need to charge for upgraded level of support for funded research can't mandate this, but must be encouraged to budget for this:
    • IT staff on call
    • custom configuration
    • application software support
• Oct. 17, 2007
  In attendance
  staff: Mike, Shaun, Dave K.;
  faculty: Leon, Roger, Me, Hakan, DK, Han-Wei
  topics:
  • web page - need to look at but not high priority in face of security/budget
  • PC upgrade - is ongoing
  • Red Hat install
  • budget pressures
    network 7 year old is next big ticket item. With budget pressures, it will not upgraded soon
  • security: compliance by March
    • office, staff, faculty, instructors, labs A, labs B
    • overall: firewalls, wireless go away; passwords updated more; no local download & installs
    • office machines: encrypt or remove data
    • staff machines: encrypt or remove data
    • research labs: old OS? secure with firewalls and patches
    • system research labs: more problematic