IT Architecture and Infrastructure Committee

9:00-10:30am, November 11, 2016, FAC 228D

I.ITS Service Review Survey Results (Brad Englert, AngelaNewell, and Ginger Yachinich)

  • Introduction and overview of survey purpose
  • Next Step is to have a retreat with all committee chairs and make some recommendations based on what comes out of that meeting.
  • Costing should be complete in December
  • Discussion: Concern about methodology of survey and validity of results
  • Angie Newell: Survey tools are one of the least reliable research tools you can use. What surveys give you is a first impression of what people are thinking about across a wide variety of areas of campus. The process from here on out will include focus groups and individual conversations that will help triangulate this data and give us an idea of where to go from here.
  • Cost diagnostics will be coming in next December for each service offering
  • Brad Englert: It takes a lot of effort to cost out each individual service offering, which is what we’re working on currently, using a zero based budget.
  • What role does OIT play in all of this? Brad Englert: It has been suggested that we go through this exercise every year.
  • Angie Newell: This is a deviation from our normal process. We now have to look at our services in light of accounting errors, rather than as a regular service review.
  • Discussion of focus group structure- two small focus groups from each governance committee will be asked a set of structured questions based on the survey findings and areas we need to explore more deeply.
  • Discussion of the role of governance and campus leaderships: Julienne Van Der Ziel: We need governance input to help us make the best decisions, because there will be some decisions that are unpalatable and we want to make them as palatable as possible.

II.IT Service Desk Steering Committee – Discussion

  • Charles Soto: Had some issues with the ITS Service Desk with putting in tickets and getting support from ITS.
  • In speaking with some folks in ITS, they were able to figure out the issue, but it was clear that there is a lot of strain on the budget and there are a lot of issues that need to be managed, but there is not an apparent oversight structure. ITS needs someone to run ideas by and get input on what to do when there are issues they are having. I am suggesting that we get an AIC committee together, a customer steering committee, to monitor metrics they’ll provide, provide feedback and recommendations to them, which they’ll implement, and then evaluate the service post implementation of AIC recommendations.
  • I am concerned about the size of committees within AIC and I’m suggesting a small group of people that includes an ITS person.
  • Julienne Van Der Ziel: I suggest a person from Service Now to serve as an advisor.
  • Charles: Perhaps. We’ll see what is needed. It may also be a good idea to have some students on the committee to bring that perspective.
  • I am proposing that I write a charter and send it out via email and will approve it next month. Please send me any thoughts you have on this via email.

III.UT Web – Update (David Moss, Trice Humpert)

  • David Moss: There were some service interruptions this past summer. During our root cause analysis, we were scattered and fighting a variety of issues behind the scenes. We have a series of reports that you all can look at. September was a pretty quiet month after the first week of classes with the UT Login issues that caused so many issues.
  • David Moss: In our analysis we found three websites of about 700 that were causing some of the interruptions. We reached out to those customers and suggested optimization for those sites and the dozen or so customers who were using them.
  • There are several web hosting sites across campus in addition to UT Web. Quick sites and the CMS hosting platform are both good if you don’t have sensitive data or need EID protection. If anyone needs help navigating those other web hosting services, we would be happy to help.
  • UT Blog Discussion: The UT Blog service is an older service, but a lot of our student groups still use it and it still has value because of that. Students cannot afford web space elsewhere.
  • David Burns: Concern about onboarding new sites and how some sites can take out the whole system if there are not enough standards for sites that are brought on.
  • Julienne Van Der Ziel: This applies to all services. We need to make sure that we operate as a community rather than individuals and looks at what reviews and analyses need to be done.
  • David Burns: We are currently still meeting our SLAs, but we are still striving for improvement. The service has been up and running for almost two years. SLAs measure or technical capabilities, but we strive for quality beyond those measures.

IV:UT Web and Login Issue (CW Belcher)

  • We have two issues that affected UT Login in August and September. One was a WPA issue. There was also an issue with authentication. We have identified the root cause and we’re working to implement a solution to that.
  • The second was a configuration change that triggered a code bug. We’re working with our vendor to test out solutions to this and those results should arrive this month.
  • I have identified some improvements we can make, which are listed in the handout included in the meeting packet.
  • Has this gone through the IM committee? CW Belcher: It has not. They are aware of the issues, but I have been out for three weeks. We will be discussing it with them on Monday.
  • Question: Rather than making another quarter million-dollar investment into UT Web and Login infrastructure, would it be better to divert that money to Sail Point?
  • CW Belcher: No. Sail Point is not an authentication service.
  • Charles Soto: I would propose that we talk about our standard communication process at a later date.

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