Vice President for Information Systems

Had this been an ordinary year, the contributions of the IS staff would be noteworthy. Use of MIT's information technology resources continue to grow. For example, the 5ESS phone system was extended to Tang Hall and Edgerton House. Over 500 network installations were completed, including 1,500 new connections in MIT offices and laboratories. The Athena Computing Environment was used by over 10,000 different users on peak days. MIT Computer Connection's annual sales reached $14 million, the highest total in its eleven year history. Major projects were completed including the Physical Plant System; upgrades to the 5ESS switch; the addition of a fourth electronic classroom; introduction of the Tether service, providing dial-up access to MITnet from off-campus; and the TULIP service, providing online access to page images of materials science journals. Two efforts yielded substantial savings. A restructuring of our mainframe service delivery processes resulted in a 30% reduction in the Fiscal 1996 budget for mainframe services, saving over $1 million. Telephone rate reductions this year resulted in an annual savings of $500,000 for the MIT community.

However, this year has been far from ordinary. IS staff have also been deeply involved in efforts to reengineer the Institute's administrative processes. Some have been doing business process redesign as leaders and members of reengineering redesign teams. Some provide computing and communications support for redesign teams. Many are now involved in transforming the way the Institute does information technology work. Last August, the I/T Transformation Team was chartered, as one of the initial reengineering teams, to redesign the way staff at the Institute work together to run, build, and help others use information technology. This team, drawn from offices across the Institute, devised a framework to meet the challenge of delivering "great systems fast" and supporting dramatic increases in network-based applications and users expected to arise from other reengineering initiatives, all without increasing the number of I/T positions. The new framework is designed so that the Institute's I/T resources can effectively enable reengineering, as well as the overall Institute mission. In March 1995, senior officers announced the launch of the I/T Transformation to the Institute's I/T staff - all of IS and those in other central offices with I/T responsibilities.

The new I/T framework has three dimensions supporting teams - work, skills, and customers. The first step in the transition to the new framework was a search to appoint a new I/T leadership team. The team is led by the Vice President for Information Systems, and has responsibility for ensuring successful results on all three dimensions. At the end of May, several appointments were announced, to become effective July 1, 1995.

• I/T process leaders focus on the work dimension: Greg Anderson is the Director, I/T Discovery; Roger Roach is the Director of I/T Service; Cecilia d'Oliveira is Director of I/T Support; and Susan Minai-Azary is the Director of I/T Integration. The search for the Director of I/T Delivery continues.

• I/T competency group leaders concentrate on the skills dimension: Tim McGovern and Shirley Picardi are Directors of I/T Competency Groups. A third I/T competency group leader will be appointed early in fiscal 1996.

• Leaders of I/T practices focus on customer advocacy: Diane Devlin is the Director of Office Computing; and Greg Jackson remains the Director of Academic Computing.

With Marilyn McMillan serving as captain for implementing the transformation, the I/T leadership team aims to complete the transition of Information Systems to the new framework by December 1995, and the transition of the other central administrative I/T efforts to the new framework by June 1996. The I/T leadership team and the IS staff

are committed to learn our way into working in the new framework, and to ensure that the new framework works for us, for our customers, and for the Institute.

James D. Bruce

ACADEMIC COMPUTING SERVICES

• ACS continued to encourage new instructional use of Athena. Diverse uses of World Wide Web services, new uses of commercial software packages in diverse subjects, and widespread use of on-line handouts, course lockers, and similar instructional resources enhanced ACS's educational benefit to the Institute.

• During the year, ACS continued to enlarge the suite of third-party software available to Athena users. A wide array of current third-party software was upgraded. In collaboration with the MIT Libraries, ACS made both the Oxford English Dictionary and the Encyclopedia Britannica available on Athena and other networked computers at MIT.

• ACS also expanded and upgraded existing electronic classrooms and other instructional facilities. In another successful partnership with the MIT Libraries, ACS helped to add of a fourth electronic classroom (E53-220) in February.

• In fiscal year 1995, ACS continued the systematic renewal of Athena equipment, replacing hundreds of outdated workstations with faster, color workstations which were chosen after an extensive competitive-bidding process. As a result, all public Athena workstations are now very capable machines.

• The ACS Visitors Center continued to provide specific details of MIT's academic computing to visitors from many states, countries, institutions, ranks, and interests. Similarly, ACS made presentations on Athena and MIT academic computing at local and national conferences.

Gregory A. Jackson

ADMINISTRATIVE SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT

• ASD delivered all components of the new Physical Plant computing system, a system which incorporates capabilities for labor, accounting, and utilities. After completing system and user acceptance tests, as well as a full parallel test, the new Plant system was implemented on July 1. At the close of fiscal year 1995, the old Plant computing system performed its final run.

• Also during this year, ASD developed a prototype data warehouse. In conjunction with many administrative officers and Personnel staff, an ASD team developed a Query Facility which allows administrators to secure academic personnel data from the warehouse. Pilot testing for this facility is planned for July 1995.

• ASD expanded the scope of Database Services by adding the Oracle database to its suite of supported databases, and by working to certify all its Database Analysts (DBAs) in Oracle.

• In a joint undertaking with Distributed Computing and Network Services (DCNS), ASD developed a lottery system for students to select Freshman Housing via an Athena interface. Currently, ASD is developing a similar lottery system for athletic activities. The athletic lottery is expected to be implemented in September 1995.

• In conjunction with the Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP), ASD has been developing an awards management system. A prototype is currently available, and Release 1.0 will be implemented in September.

• In addition, ASD provided many resources for the reengineering efforts including: SAP database work, SAP data administration, Information Technology ("R-Ready") Infrastructure redesign and implementation, Appointments Process (TAP) implementation, and TAP Query Facility (TQF) implementation.

COMPUTING SUPPORT SERVICES

• In its eleventh year of operation, the MIT Computer Connection (MCC) reached its highest revenue total, $14 million, and its highest total unit sales, 3,465 units. During the year, the MCC continued to sell aggressively-priced Athena workstations through the Purchasable Workstation Program, among other products recommended for student use. Working with the Supplier Consolidation and Desk-I/T reengineering teams, the MCC piloted the Save-A-Bundle sales program. This program, which delivered specifically-packaged computing hardware and software to the community, bolstered the MCC's year-end revenue numbers by $1.7 million, while saving buyers some $0.5 million over then-current prices. In the process, the MCC secured a greater awareness of reengineering-recommended desktop units within the MIT community.

• CSS Consulting (CSSC) continued to provide Macintosh, DOS/Windows, and Athena technical support, in addition to consulting and user-account services to the MIT community. Help was provided on-line, by telephone, and in person. Meanwhile, CSSC continued to encourage clients towards self-sufficiency attained by developing self-help resources, user groups, local experts, and other outreach programs. The CSS Access Technology for Information and Computing (ATIC) Lab provided adaptive technology recommendations.

• CSS Computer Services (CS) is a support organization for users of DEC, Sun, and Silicon Graphics workstations. It is also a repair facility for Apple and IBM PC computers and Hewlett-Packard printers. CS provides key hardware and software support services to a diverse constituency of users on campus, at Lincoln Lab, and at other remote sites. During FY 1995, CS implemented the Silicon Graphics Varsity program, which provides discounted software and hardware maintenance for Silicon Graphics workstations.

• To support MIT's reengineering efforts, Training and Publication Services (TPS) staff members actively participated on numerous reengineering teams. Apart from their work for reengineering, TPS staff continued their work for Information Systems. Their most significant accomplishment in the publications area was the effort to make many paper documents accessible in electronic format via the World Wide Web. During the year, TPS documents won three awards from national professional organizations. Attendance at hands-on courses, Quick Start sessions, and noon-time demos continued to be strong. Over the year, close to 5,000 students attended Athena Mini-courses on 14 topics.

• The Director's Office continued its role of coordinating services throughout CSS. Fulfilling part of this role, it reviewed, negotiated, and approved vendor software license agreements.

Daniel M. Weir

DISTRIBUTED COMPUTING AND NETWORK SERVICES

Use of DCNS products and services continued to grow by almost every visible metric again this year. For example, traffic on the campus-wide computer network backbone (in terms of average kilobytes per day) increased by 74%. On an average day, central electronic mail servers delivered 150,000 mail messages (40% growth) to a total of over 300,000 recipients. Further, DCNS staff coordinated over 500 network installation projects which included 1,500 unshielded twisted-pair Ethernet (UTPE) connections in MIT offices and laboratories. The number of DCNS-managed UTPE connections in MIT offices and laboratories was 3,295 by the end of the year.

As well, a number of significant milestones were reached during the year:

• In collaboration with Telecommunications System (Telecom) and Computing Support Services (CSS), DCNS introduced Tether on May 1, 1995. This new service provides dial-up access to MITnet from off-campus locations via Point-to-Point (PPP) and Appletalk Remote Access (ARA ) communication protocols.

• Also working with Telecom, DCNS helped in the extension of the residential computing network (Resnet) to several graduate dormitories in September 1994. Resnet will be available in all graduate dormitories by fall 1995.

• In collaboration with Academic Computing Services (ACS) and CSS, DCNS focused on the evolution of Athena software and hardware. New initiatives included a release of Athena software for Silicon Graphics (SGI) workstations and a planned deployment of hundreds of new SGI and Sun workstations during the summer and fall of 1995 to renew obsolete equipment.

• In a partnership with the MIT Libraries, DCNS continued work on the Distributed Library Initiative, an effort to radically improve electronic library services available over MITnet. Progress this year included the development of an image browser that provides on-line access to the full-text of a limited set of scientific journals as part of a multi-campus research project.

• DCNS worked with other Information Systems groups to begin implementing a new long-term strategy for MIT's on-line campus information service based on World Wide Web technology. As part of the new strategy, a Campus Wide Information System (CWIS) Facilitator was appointed in July 1994 to promote the evolution of CWIS, and to assist MIT offices in their use of the Web. This decision was validated by the rapid growth of Web use at MIT and elsewhere over the last twelve months, growth which has been both phenomenal and unprecedented.

• DCNS staff participated intensively in numerous MIT reengineering projects and teams, including Supplier Consolidation, Information Technology (I/T) Transformation, I/T Infrastructure Readiness, I/T Help, Maintenance and Repair, and the Appointment Process (TAP).

Cecilia R. d'Oliveira

OPERATIONS AND SYSTEMS

• This year, O&S did an extensive review of its mainframe service delivery processes. The goal of the review was to achieve significant reductions in the cost of providing mainframe services while providing equal or better services. Processes such as the way output was delivered and the way the mainframe operating system (VM) was maintained were scrutinized.

• The result of these and other review activities was a restructuring that yielded a 30% reduction in the Fiscal 1996 budget for mainframe services -- a savings of over $1 million to the Institute's bottom line. Other freed resources were applied to the Institute's reengineering project.

• As part of its core business, Data Center Operations, O&S kept supported systems up and running 99.8% of the time; responded to over 5000 help desk calls; ran nearly 30,000 production jobs; mounted 132,000 tapes; and printed over 170,000 files that amounted to a total of 14 million pages.

• Another of O&S's accomplishments this year was the upgrade and continued support of the mainframe. The IBM 9121 mainframe computer continues to serve many of MIT's critical business systems. To provide continually improving performance, reliability, and availability, its main memory capacity was doubled, and new "fault tolerant" disk technology was installed. (These upgrades were accomplished with minimal cost to the Institute.) O&S also implemented a Kerberized VM telnet server to provide secured access to the mainframe, and upgraded the VM operating system. Further, a successful Business Continuity test was conducted in conjunction with Payroll and Administrative Systems Development (ASD), to verify the Institute's ability to produce a payroll in `disaster mode.'

• The Facilities Management group supports eight departments by housing and maintaining their 16 dedicated computer systems, including the new Student Information System. This year, the group installed and configured the GEAC Library system.

• Throughout the year, significant O&S resources were devoted to reengineering projects such as Infrastructure Readiness ("R-Ready"), the Appointments Process (TAP), Mail, and Management Reporting. O&S is helping to examine the processes inherent in these areas, and is also helping to specify, install, and maintain new systems that will become the backbone of the reengineered processes. Systems installed include the SAP R/3 Management Reporting system, the People Database system, the Appointments Process system, and the OSP Award system. Finally, Mandarin's version control component is being prepared for production use to facilitate the updating of individual desktop computers.

Roger A. Roach

TELECOMMUNICATIONS SYSTEMS

• During the year, Telecom implemented rate reductions effective January 1, 1995 which reduced the cost of local Boston area telephone calls by $0.03 each. Domestic long distance telephone rates were reduced by 20%. Taken together, these rate reductions resulted in an annual savings of $500,000 for the MIT community.

• In August 1994, Telecom implemented MIT 5ESS telephone and MITnet services in Tang Hall and Edgerton House. Similar services will be implemented in Eastgate and Westgate in August 1995.

• At the end of September 1994, Telecom upgraded the MIT 5ESS generic software to 5E6, and several months later to 5E8. Telecom plans to upgrade the generic software to 5E9 at the end of July 1995, and to implement a Primary Rate Interface (PRI) in August 1995. PRI will facilitate applications like remote access, and will enable improved communications between the main MIT campus and its remote components, such as the Lincoln Lab. PRI is the first step in a migration strategy of providing interconnectivity of the MIT 5ESS with the digital public switched-network, also known as the Signaling System 7 (SS7) network.

• Working with MIT-Lincoln Laboratory and Teleport Communications Group/Boston, Telecom installed single-mode fiber optic cables to interconnect buildings 35, 36, and 9. Buildings 35 and 36 are part of a three-point fiber optic network between the MIT campus, Lincoln Laboratory, and DEC's Littleton facility, a network which enables the testing and evaluation of wave-length division-multiplexing equipment designed and fabricated at the Lincoln Laboratory.

• During fiscal year 1995, Telecom also participated in a number of videoconferencing applications. Working with the Center for Advanced Engineering Study (CAES) and others, the department successfully completed a videoconference trial with the NHK Television Network of Japan. This successful trial was followed by a CAES videoconference highlighting MIT which was broadcast to Japanese television viewers on Christmas day 1995. Another trial, under the auspices of the Sloan School, involved the interoperability of British Telecom videoconferencing units sited locally at the Endicott House, with a remote site in London, England. Another trial involved a consortium of universities, including MIT, sponsored by the Department of Defense. This last trial aimed to establish the feasibility of a videoconferencing network and application sharing, and to demonstrate its use in the design studio of the future.

• In partnership with Campus Police and Physical Plant among others, Telecom initiated a program to enhance security in campus parking garages and lots. The department continued to install emergency telephones to ensure the safety of the MIT community.

• Also during fiscal year 1995, Telecom signed agreements with Cellular One and NYNEX Mobile. Both agreements resulted in reduced cellular telephone rates for the MIT community.

• In collaboration with Physical Plant and Distributed Computing & Network Services (DCNS), Telecom began a project to enhance telephone closets throughout the campus. To date, telephone closets in approximately 30 buildings have been enhanced.

Morton Berlan

MIT Reports to the President 1994-95