In 1998-99, WSU information technology staff were consumed by preparation for Y2K (all major systems passed the final test on November 7, 1999 with flying colors), a major upgrade to the university e-mail system (upgrading Novell GroupWise to 5.5.1), and a major desktop operating system change (converting the campus standard from Microsoft Windows 95/98 to Windows NT 4.0).  None of these projects went absolutely smoothly, and clean-up of the remaining problems continued well into the Fall Semester.

In spite of these major disruptions, progress was made on the 1998-99 technology goals as follows:

1. Student Support Systems (6-38380). In keeping with WSU's long term technology goal to "Construct and maintain modern, accessible voice/data/video communications systems for both Internet [World Wide Web] and Intranet access," a portion of the student support system funding was spent on a major overhaul of the university's website.  (For a look at the result, go to http://weber.edu.)  The new website was constructed with the help of an external consultant and is based on a "customer-oriented" philosophy to better serve students, faculty, staff and the general public.
   
   Funds were also spent on the purchase of web-based training to help individuals (primarily staff) acquire and upgrade needed technology skills.  In addition, ten new computers and a new scanner were acquired for the primary training lab.
   
   After considerable review and discussion, a set of standard software applications was identified for access from all student computer labs and the university network; licenses were purchased and distribution and metering tools developed and implemented.  The result has been a compliment of software tools that students and faculty can "count on" from wherever they have access.  Also, a small portion of the funds was used to join the "i-drive University Consortium" used by schools such as Stanford, Berkeley, Wake Forest and others to provide free Internet file storage (25MB) to all students, faculty and staff.
   
   Because these funds are essentially one-time, it was decided not to hire additional staff on a temporary appointment.  Enhancement to the existing information technology staff was accomplished by outsourcing several functions and by increasing the amount spent on hourly staff.
   
   
2. Institutional Infrastructure/Equipment Maintenance (6-38381).  
   
   As agreed, a portion of these funds were held back by USHE to pay centrally for each participating institution's Novell site license.   This left WSU with $73,561 to address other needs in 1998-99.
   
   A portion of these funds was spent on a SUN workstation and network sniffer software to help detect and diagnose network problems.  The monies were also used to cover the one-year cost of a critical equipment lease and an ISDN test.  
   
   However, the bulk of the funding was spent on an RFP for, and implementation of, a new backbone for the university computing network [the total cost was over $150,000 so most of the resources came from other institutional sources].  The new network backbone is based on Lucent Technologies Cajun switching equipment.  It replaced obsolete 3Com equipment and a "star" topology that suffered from a fundamental single-point-of-failure weakness.  The new "meshed" topology has several primary network nodes with redundant fiber optic links between them for improved network reliability.