Serving the Research Mission:An Approach to Central IT’s Role

Matthew StockUniversity at Buffalo

Copyright Matthew Stock, 2008. This work is the intellectual property of the author. Permission is granted for this material to be shared for non-commercial, educational purposes, provided that this copyright statement appears on the reproduced materials and notice is given that the copying is by permission of the author. To disseminate otherwise or to republish requires written permission of the author.

For Today

• Overview of UB• Motivation• Accomplishments• Key Steps• Challenges• What’s Next

University at Buffalo

• Comprehensive, research-intensive public university

• A flagship of State University of New York (SUNY) system

• 10,035 full-time employees• 18,779 undergraduates, 9,275 grad and

professional• Thirteen schools including:

― Medicine, Dental, Nursing, Pharmacy― Management, Law, Social Work― Engineering, Architecture

IT at UB

• Distributed IT― Primarily at the school level― Major research centers

• CIO’s area composed of six service areas:― Enterprise Infrastructure Services (EIS)― Operational Support Services (OSS)― Administrative Computing Services (ACS)― Academic Services (ASCIT)― Information Security Office (ISO)― Enterprise Research Computing Services (ERCS)

History

• New president and provost initiated academic excellence program in 2004― Growth― Quality― Operational improvements― IT realignment toward academic goals

• New research building May 2006

Bioinformatics Center

• Multidisciplinary• Central IT providing client support• Opportunity to evaluate alternative IT support

methods• Long-term faculty interactions

Enterprise Research Computing Services

• New CIO unit formalized in July 2007• Goals:

― Identify research IT gaps― Implement, support research services―Advocate, coordinate within campus IT

• Service integration• Project management• Consulting

Motivation

• Funding competition• Costly infrastructure• Multidisciplinary, multi-institutional work• Cooperation between IT units

What We’ve Done

• Broad awareness campaign focused on faculty and administrators across institution

• Multi-unit project and service teams• Developed slate of high value projects

― File storage, backup, archive (done)― Condor compute system in public labs (done)― Several others in progress

• Credibility for future activities

Key Components

• Communication― Customer: Faculty― Partners: CCR, VP for research, IT units― Admin: Associate Deans, Faculty Senate,

Deans/VPs• Support from Senior Administration

― Strong ties to institutional goals― Prioritization in face of limited resources

• Building Trust

Building Trust

• Traditional distrust of central IT• Start with personal trust• Experience with faculty• Delivering on commitments builds

organizational trust

Research IT Survey

• Initiated by CCR, CIO, and VPR office

• Goals― Validate individual interviews― Prioritize research IT investments― Identify projects

• Strong response rate (158 faculty)

• Report:

http://www.cio.buffalo.edu/res-comp-survey.pdf

Six Recommendation Areas

• Collaboration Tools― Help researchers communicate more effectively

• Research Data Storage Needs― Data archiving, backup, disk space

• Programming and Staff Support― Training and specialized staff skills

• Plan for Increased Computing Needs• Networking• Research Grant Administration

― Reduce effort spent on administrative activities

Storage Services for Research

• Leverage existing infrastructure• Institutional service description• Storage pool focused on “seeding” research

projects• Direct purchase available• Free server backups• Archive still a work in progress

Condor

• Collaboration between CIO area and CCR• Goal to make unused computing capacity in

public sites available to researchers• Completed on schedule• Pool currently has ~ 1.2 TFLOPS of computing

capacity

Planning Phase

• Research Channel for UB portal― Content from multiple sources

• Document Collaboration Tool― Inter- and Intra-institutional, multi-platform,

offline• PI (Faculty) Profile

― Searchable index of faculty activities― Tie to institutional data

Future Projects

• Research Wiki• Desktop Videoconferencing• Improved Accounts Management for External

Collaborators• Research Software Licensing• Research Drop Box• Database Collections

Governance

• Reuse existing standing structures― CIO’s advisory council: policy, planning― IT unit leaders: IT-specific issues

• Form ad hoc task groups for short-term needs― Select interested faculty― Limit scope, timetable

• Advisory groups for specific service issues?

Challenges

• Limited resources• Existing organizational structures/silos• Confusion regarding role• Inconsistent priorities

Advice

• Start small• Don’t look for fundamental change• Gain executive support• Communicate, communicate, communicate

Next Steps

• Test governance model• Multi-unit services?• Develop long term strategic plan