ITPAC Meeting Minutes: August 5, 1999

Last edited September 16, 1999 by Fedro S. Zazueta.

Call to Order

A regular meeting of the ITPAC was held on Thursday, August 5, 1999. The meeting was called to order by Vernon Parmenter, Chairman, at 9:00am in Food & Resource Economics Department, room 1151-B.

Attendees

Present: Eight members were present: Phil Achey, Joe Joyce, Jerry Kidder, Vernon Parmenter, Craig Stanley, Ashley Wood, Roger Clemmons, Fedro Zazueta.

Absent: Five members were absent: Mary Ann Andrews, Larry Halsey, Jim Syvertsen, Ricky Telg, Pete Vergot.

Approve Prior Minutes

The minutes of the April 22, 1999 meeting were reviewed. Minutes were then approved.

IT Status

County Connectivity Issues

Zazueta shared:

  • VP to pay for reoccurring expense of connectivity.
  • T-1 lines in some counties.
  • LAN in every County Extension Office, except Lafayette and Sumter connected to Internet

Divestment from VAX Platform

  • Vax will end on 06/30/2000.
  • Will use T-1 lines for faster connectivity.
  • Savings to pay for new server in 2 years.

Support & Training

  • 3 FTE's.
  • Cross-trained for wiring installation.
  • Have 40 classes.

Programs

  • IT academic program provide for a Ph.D. with Information Technology as a minor.
  • 4-H technology program will take 4 months to implement.
  • UF/IFAS software development--no new products.
  • County Extension Offices web development - help county offices develop web pages

Items of Interest

  • Network stewardship - management of system continues to evolve.
  • Software standardization - WordPerfect will continue to migrate to MS Word. Counties and many units use MS Suite.

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New Items

Hosting non-IFAS pages

Will be discussed at next meeting.

Reconstruction of UF/IFAS Web Page

  • A committee will be appointed by VP.
  • Many questions need to be answered.

Staffing Issues for IT Professional

Need some level of awareness that IT people can get better jobs elsewhere.

Campus Computing Cooperative Initiative

  • Campus-wide CIO now.
  • Gator-link accounts will probably be needed in future for email, etc.

Campus Network Consolidation/Direction

  • There have been meetings on networking.
  • Each area must pay for the equipment.
  • Campus networking functional but requires upgrades.
  • Major information structure project.

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