Melissa Conrad
Secretary to the Committee
March 27, 2013
Present:
Dave Wallace (Chair), Melissa Conrad (Secretary), Bill Baer, Pascal Calarco, Bruce Campbell, Marko Dumancic, Bob Hicks, Bill Ince, Dawn Keenan, Dave Kibble, Paul Miskovsky, Terry Stewart, Jason Testart , Martin Timmerman
Regrets:
Andrea Chappell, Erick Engelke, Robyn Landers
Agenda
- Chair’s remarks (1:30-1:40pm)
- Approval of the minutes of the meeting of March 7, 2013 and business arising (1:40-1:50pm)
- Student Printing discussion (1:50-2:15pm; all)
- IT Strategy, Enterprise Architecture, and Organize for Success update (2:15-2:30pm; Andrea Chappell, Dave Wallace, Bob Hicks)
- Updates (2:30-2:45pm; Various)
- Email (Martin Timmerman)
- Active Directory (Martin Timmerman)
- Green IT (Marko Dumancic)
- IT security (Jason Testart)
- Campus Firewall Project (Bruce Campbell)
- Student Printing (Bill Baer)
- Other business (2:45-3:00pm)
- Next Computing Technology and Services Committee (CTSC) meeting
[Will be held Thursday, April 4, 2013, at 1:30 p.m., in Mathematics & Computing building (MC) 2018A.]
Chair's remarks
Agenda
The Chair reviewed the agenda and indicated that at an upcoming meeting, Andrea Chappell will provide information on identification of indicators (measurements) that map to the strategic objectives.
University funding
Funding will likely become tight over the next couple of years. More details will be provided as they become available.
Excellence Canada
In conjunction with the Staff Lifecycle Project, various organizational excellence programs are being investigated. Excellence Canada is one program being considered and background information will be distributed to CTSC.
Approval of the minutes of the meeting of March 7, 2013 and business arising
The minutes of the meeting of March 7, 2013 were approved.
Digital Media Asset Management. Pascal Calarco has put together a recommendation package which will be distributed to University Committee on Information Systems & Technology (UCIST). As this solution space is rapidly evolving with no “silver bullet” solution for all cases, the Digital Media Asset Management (DMAM) group is recommending a federated approach to managing digital assets, based on a best of breed approach for different use cases, and leveraging current software in place as well as recommending solutions for unmet needs.
Student Printing discussion
Currently, students take money from WatCard and transfer it into their eXtensible Accounting System (XAS) account to print. In some areas (such as Environment and Architecture), additional software is used which requires the student to then transfer the funds from XAS to another print account. To print in multiple areas, a student would need to leave some funds in XAS and some on their other print account. One system for all student printing is the goal.
CTSC members agree in principle, but are concerned about the business process. If a new system is implemented, will revenue continue to be distributed as it is now? It was stated that May Yan will likely seek reimbursement for the cost of the software but that remaining funds would be distributed based on usage. Also, a committee member asked who would be refilling paper, etc. Baer stated that the planned pilot will help to define these business processes and that these also may be decisions that each group will make independently, in consultation with Yan.
The operational model cost will need to be documented. Information will be prepared and presented to UCIST on April 12th. Also, the Request For Proposal (RFP) will be issued in April.
Terry Stewart will have a discussion with Bill Baer and Marko Dumancic offline to ensure that unique needs of some non-pilot groups will be considered during the pilot.
IT Strategy, Enterprise Architecture, and Organize for Success Initiative update (Andrea Chappella (via email), Bob Hicks, Dave Wallace)
IT Strategic Plan
- IT Strategic Plan 2nd open house to be held in the morning, March 26th.
- Website being updated in advance of open house to reflect activity to date, including the evolving IT directions.
- The IT directions and activities are solidifying. On Friday, March 15th UCIST discussed and prioritised a set of activities. These will be incorporated into the evolving IT directions report.
- The IT directions report will tie together directions and priority activities, with the IT strategy, especially the Strategic Objectives, overarching "themes", and the report from data analysis that led to them.
- Examples of themes/directions include usability, information management, governance and federated approaches.
- IST faces challenges in acting on prioritized activities when other departments play most significant role in those directions (e.g., Finance and Financial Online Reporting Environment (FORE) usability).
- Indicator work by the Task Force has identified potential measures. Most are new so we will need to determine how to proceed, whether we need new activities/projects to put them in place, and which would bring the most benefit. Meeting with Daniela in Institutional Analysis & Planning (IAP) to bring forward indicators into the university plans.
- Work needs to begin on the structure of governance (e.g., mandate and composition of UCIST, along with "feeder" groups). Also on the federated model, starting to define the facets of relationships (e.g., Information Systems & Technology (IST) to faculty IT groups).
- A list of identified “pain points” will be distributed to CTSC.
More information on the IT Strategic Plan can be found at the web site.
Enterprise Architecture
Enterprise Business Intelligence (EBI) will be brought forward to the Student Communications Technology Project Committee on March 22nd. EBI will drive data provisioning to the proposed student portal as well as to student/faculty applications (web and mobile-based) through EBI web services. Significant work is required to prepare and develop this robust architecture. The EBI program will be led by Derek Kirkland. Subsequent to initial setup and testing, this will be brought to CTSC for review.
Organize for Success
An Organize for Success update was provided to UCIST. The future state, functional area outline was reviewed and some discussion occurred regarding the teaching/learning support function. Teaching and Learning technology support makes sense to be done by IST but the governance for directions and strategy belongs elsewhere. A meeting with members of IST, Center for Extended Learning (CEL), the Associate Vice-President, Academic (Mario Coniglio) and possibly others will be held to discuss this further.
UCIST members also expressed concern around web development. Their thinking was that good work has been started but they want to ensure that things continue to progress.
The slides presented at UCIST will be distributed to CTSC members.
Updates
Email (Martin Timmerman)
The Campus Email Services Committee (CESC) group has been working on getting a better understanding of who can/should send out email as uwaterloo.ca. Details are included in the group’s most recent meeting minutes. A proposal will be developed and brought to CTSC on April 18th and then to UCIST.
Active Directory (Martin Timmerman)
The group is currently working through some processes with regard to change management. Colin Bell will update on the consolidation progress at the April 4th meeting.
Green IT (Marko Dumancic)
James McCarthy, the Green IT Chair, will provide an update to CTSC on May 2nd and has requested that CTSC provide some direction regarding future initiatives.
IT security (Jason Testart)
Committee members advised that a good time to schedule the Windows Security course may be during the middle of a term. Testart will distribute possible dates to CTSC in advance of the next meeting [secretary’s note: Proposed dates are the week of May 27th or the week of June 3rd].
Campus Firewall (Bruce Campbell)
- Core restructuring is almost complete; fibre work complete; final patching and reconfiguration to be done shortly.
- Updated router/Network Address Translation (NAT) for WiFi ordered. This will free up a pair of Juniper SRX 3600's which will become the border firewalls.
- IST, Applied Health Sciences (AHS) and Arts have reported some progress on preparation of spreadsheets for required exemptions (please upload to the server list)
- Next phase on publicity to begin (another campaign would be timely and encourage use of Virtual Private Network (VPN))
- After the firewall is installed, IST will start work migrating academic support buildings to be behind the firewall (e.g. Needles Hall (NH), General Services Complex (GSC)).
- Reminder that the end of the year will approach quickly and we've committed to have this project complete before then.
Student Printing (Bill Baer)
Covered under agenda item #3.
Other business
Cell coverage improvements
Major cell carriers have identified difficulty responding to increased cell phone usage on campus properties. The carriers advise that demand can only be met by locating an antenna on University of Waterloo property -- ideally close to the center of the south campus, where the majority of users are.
There have been a series of meetings over the past year, with IST, Plant Operations, and Procurement, which led to the creation of an RFP for campus cell service improvements via rooftop antennae. Upon review of RFP results, Plant Operations was uncomfortable with the amount of equipment that would be installed on the rooftop (in addition to the antennae).
Plant Operations has proposed consideration of a tower to be located on green space on the south campus. The carrier and Plant Operations are satisfied with the location, subject to design and technical considerations. The tower would be a monopole design, 45 metres tall.
A proposal with artist renditions is being prepared. Other carriers will be consulted on the location also.
Next meeting
The next meeting will be held on April 4, 2013, at 1:30pm, in MC 2018A.