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Meeting: October 16, 1998
Minutes
The meeting was held in Room 206 of the K-State Union at 3:00 p.m. CITAC members in attendance were: Dan Bernardo, Ken Brooks, Jean Darbyshire, Matthew Dwyer, Faye Kennedy, Bryan Kraus, Cynthia McCahon, Vincent Ortiz, Ron Semarge, Bradley Shaw, chair, Gail Simmonds, John Streeter, Harvard Townsend, Roger Terry, and Beth Unger.
Shaw reported that Beth Unger had met with Faculty Senate in September to discuss the need for more secure passwords. She told them about hacker attacks that reveal the vulnerability of our systems. A first step in developing a more secure environment is to require that the most vulnerable passwords be changed right away, and that all faculty and staff change their passwords as soon as possible.
Campus-Wide Calendar/Scheduler. Harvard Townsend presented the "preliminary report" of the Campus-Wide Calendar/Scheduler Committee (ten members) which outlines in great detail their analysis of what they determined to be the three most viable programs: GroupWise (Novell), Synchronize (CrossWind Technologies), and Netscape Calendar. The committee recommendation was to standardize on Netscape Calendar for campus-wide calendars and schedules "due to its features, perceived ease of use, adherence to Internet standards, and lower cost of ownership." The recommendation was to purchase 1000 licenses at a cost of $11,400 (purchasing Netscape Communicator Pro, which includes the Calendar product). The recommendation was not to make the program available to students because of the cost of a full site license and increased costs of support. Townsend emphasized that GroupWise was strongly considered, especially because it would be included as a Novell product under the anticipated site license being negotiated with Novell. The main reason against recommending GroupWise was that the total cost of ownership (including higher training costs and much greater central staff and server support) and the fact that selecting GroupWise would also require that it become the campus e-mail tool. Since this was beyond the scope of the committee's charge, it recommended that in the near future another committee address the issue of a campus-wide "e-mail solution." In the ensuing discussion several questions were raised about costs to users should the calendar/scheduler be used by more than the initial number of 1000 users. Ken Brooks spoke of the need for academic departments to be involved in the using the program. Dan Bernardo volunteered his department as one to include should the license be funded and implementation begin in the spring. He argued that it was important to encourage as many users as possible. The benefit of such a program was best realized when the greatest number of users is involved. Harvard agreed to present his committee's report by the next meeting (November 17). One question had to do with the ease of conversion from GroupWise users to Netscape Calendar. Most of the GroupWise users are in the library and in the Division of Continuing Education. It was important to provide adequate information and training for people in those units.
Novell site license. Harvard made reference to negotiations regarding a site license with Novell that would enable us to upgrade all local area networks to meet Year 2000 specifications, to improve data integrity on campus, and be cost effective. In the discussion of this issue there were several questions asked regarding costs. Committee members wanted to know what financial burdens would be placed on the departments who currently use Novell products. Would they be required to upgrade their LANs, and at what cost? A more complete report was promised for the next meeting.
Speakers. Faye Kennedy announced two speakers for November and December. Janet Pauley, University of Nebraska-Lincoln will speak on distance education issues on November 10. The exact time was yet to be determined. On December 8, Prof. Sharon Marcos (Human Ecology) is scheduled to speak in the Hemisphere Room of Hale Library at 2:30 p.m. She will speak on copyright issues for those who developed Web-based courses.
The meeting was adjourned at 4:50.
For CITAC,
Bradley Shaw
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