Minutes of the meeting held 17th September 2002. Present: Owen Atkin, Paul Waites, Julie Lord,Richard Firn (Chair), Ian Jennings. Cake: A rather poor Apple cake
ICDB 02/18 Apologies for absence. None - Lorna Evans is on LOA
ICDB 02/19 Minutes of the meeting 25/03/02. These were accepted.
ICDB 02/20 Matters arising:
Time Management Software (ICDB 02/11). Awaiting response from MIS.
Biohelp pages (ICDB 02/13). PW was thanked for getting this up and running
on time. He will use the Bulletin to lead people to additions. New staff and
students will be pointed to it as the first port of call for help.
Room booking software (ICDB 02/14). The TF were evaluating MRBS and
it was hoped to use that experience to progress this issue.
Biology Web Pages (ICDB 02/15). Due to the absence of LE no progress
was reported. It was agreed that greater effort was needed to tackle this issue
and OA agreed to form and lead a subgroup to define the overall approach to
web page provision within the department. This group will define how the pages
are to be managed and what resources will be needed to ensure that the pages
are maintained. The subgroup will also inform the ICDB of any other matters
that it considers need to be considered in order to maintain and co-ordinate
this increasingly important part of the department's activities.
IT appointments (ICDB 02/16) IJ informed the committee of the attempts
that were made since the last meeting to co-ordinate the expansion of IT provision
within the TF and CNAP and how that will influence events. The co-operation
and interaction between the various groups had been good so far
Undergraduate Admin and YIMS (ICDB 02/17). A meeting had been held with the YIMS team and the issue of the way in which the YIMS and the Biology Department's needs would both be met. Progress had been made in that the YIMS group were now prepared to consider how a technical solution to the problem could be found and were no longer insisting that the only way forward was for all major users in Biology to use Computing Service supported PCs (which would be a costly approach for Biology in terms of integrating all users within the Biology network). JL noted that as a major user she would not want to have her ability to communicate with the rest of the department inhibited by any YIMS system.
ICDB 02/21 Audit report. An independent report had been received which considered
how robust our IT systems were in terms of hardware and the management practices.
The Chair reported that his reading of the report suggested that the department
was being well served by its IT team and had good reason to be confident in
our systems. The possible weaknesses that had been identified were being addressed.
Two issues were discussed:
Software Audit. No comprehensive list of software used in the department
exists. It was agreed that this was an issue that needed consideration and discussion
at a later meeting.
Data backup from individual PCs. There was evidence that data important to the functioning of the department, or groups within the department, is often stored on local hard disks without proper backup procedures. As a start at tackling this potential problem, PW will produce information for the Bulletin on how data can be backed up.
ICDB 02/22 IT Budget. A budget of £42,000 had been submitted and
accepted by Finance Committee. IJ had some concerns that some unpredictable
extra costs arising from the new staff and the moves may challenge his budget.
IJ also noted that the costs associated with maintaining or upgrading the IT
infrastructure needed a longer term view and that such planning would be part
of the preparations for the budget for subsequent years.
ICDB 02/23 AV budget. It was agreed that all departmental expenditure
should be channelled via the ICDB in future and that the committee should have
an appropriate budget for this item. Should the ICDB be given this responsibility,
PW would be asked to prepare an AV strategy.
ICDB 02/24 Data ownership. The Chair suggested that a small subgroup
should be set up to consider the issue of data ownership and who has the right
to view and use data kept on computers used in the Biology Department. It was
argued that the University Policy with regards to the issue covered centrally
managed PCs but left too many unresolved issues with regards to personal PCs.
RDF will form and lead this subgroup and report back to the ICDB at the next
meeting as to its composition. JCP and SMM were names suggested as potential
members of this group.
ICDB 02/23 Training It was agreed that the issue of IT training needs
to be revisited and that JCP should be asked to consider how the needs are identified
and met.