Technical Review Group (TRG)Agenda

27/04/06 TRG RemitMembershipOperationICT StrategyICT Roadmap

Why TRG?

TRG was formed to develop and maintain the University’s ICT strategy and report to IPSC on IT related issues including Technology solutions that may help the Information Strategy and Development Group (ISDG) shape strategic directionTRG Membership consists of Faculty and AIMS nominated IT experts who have the authority to act on behalf on the constituency they representTRG Operates by establishing short life WGs of experts to investigate, report and make recommendations on specific IT technologies and their potential role within the University’s ICT strategy

ICT Infrastructure Strategy Has a vision and guiding principlesDefines the Technical EnvironmentDefines and maintains a progressive IT roadmap for service delivery and developmentThe overall aim is to define the technical environment and direction that the IT roadmap will follow such that centrally provided and faculty/department provided services meet the University’s requirements over an agreed timeframeIdentifies standards based ‘cost effective’ technology that will provide supportable ‘timeline' and evolutionary solutions to the above

ICT Infrastructure VisionThe University will provide a feature rich, integrated, supportable and secure technological environment that provides staff and students with seamless, any time, any place, access to the Information Technology resources that support and enhance their activities.

ICT Infrastructure Environment May be Categorised as

Persistent – ‘Always on’Transparent – Integrated and reliableDynamic – Relevant over timeBorderless – Accessible from anywhereFlexible – Able to adaptCommunity based – To enhance activities

Guiding PrinciplesThe University recognises the strategic importance of information technology and is prepared to invest in the continual development of its IT resources The University will develop and communicate policies and strategies that will govern the use and provide direction on support of IT resources The University sees value for money as an important consideration in all IT investments and will seek to take advantage of economies of scale wherever possible The University will implement industry standards, best practice and supportable solutions

Guiding PrinciplesThe University recognises the strategic importance of information technology and is prepared to invest in the continual development of its IT resources The University will develop and communicate policies and strategies that will govern the use and provide direction on support of IT resources The University sees value for money as an important consideration in all IT investments and will seek to take advantage of economies of scale wherever possible The University will implement industry standards, best practice and supportable solutions

Guiding PrinciplesThe University will promote an ICT Service ethos supported by the most appropriate technologyThe University is a major research led institution and as such places demands on the technical infrastructure The University will seek to maximise the opportunities offered by external funding where the activities to be undertaken can be properly resourced in terms of staffing and which dovetail with the IT roadmap

IT resources must be of a high quality, secure and universally available to authorised users

Guiding PrinciplesThe University recognises that support overheads must be addressed when costing IT investmentsThe University will increasingly adopt IT to support its core functions, users will become increasingly IT aware and expect access to feature rich, reliable, secure, integrated and easy to use services Users will increasingly require access to IT resources via a variety of devices including personal computers, portable computers, PDAs and other mobile devices Communities will be established to promote effective consultation, knowledge transfer, sharing of best practice and avoidance of duplicated effort The University recognises the need for user and IT support staff training

Technical Infrastructure

Core Services

Network Applications and Services

Teaching Research AdminCommon

User Base

Technical Environment

Technical Infrastructure

First Building Block for Strategic Service provision and developmentProvides Campus wide data communications infrastructure and Routing servicesProvides flexible connectivity optionsProvides Resilience, High Bandwidths, QoS and securityImplements Industry standard solutions

Core ServicesSecond Building Block for strategic service provision and developmentBrings strategic services together under a single management domain to achieve economies of scale and consistency of provisionProvides services that are sustainable, resilient and highly available e.g

Access to technical infrastructure including Flexible and remote accessDNS and IP address managementE-Mail relays, SPAM filteringWeb Services, cachingInformation Security servicesFile store delivery and data managementDirectories and ID management

Common ServicesAccess to E-mail and other personal communications methodsAccess to WWW including rich media contentSecurity including advice, incident response and patch managementAccess to serviced desktop environments providing common authentication schemes network file store, print services, platform security and relevant applicationsSupport – help desk, specialist teams and trainingSite licenses and license management for common applications

Applications and ServicesProvides specific solutions for University strategic requirements e.g

To leverage the benefits of IT in support of the University’s core activities; Requires

• Applications and Services definition and implementation

• Integration with technical infrastructure and core services

• Delivery and support• Ongoing review

Management and support domains need not be the same but should be consistent and co-operative

Teaching

Open access and Faculty specific clusters operating common authentication schemes and desktop environments; providing, security file store, print and relevant applicationsPortals and VLEInteractive Video teachingFlexible access facilities for accessing IT resources using personal systems

Research

Access to high bandwidth Local Area Network connectionsFlexibility in accommodating research projects requiring special featuresAccess to high performance computing resources; locally, nationally and internationallyAbility to store and manipulate large data setsAccess to worldwide virtual organisations and research communities

Administration

Holistic approach to corporate information systems developmentSecure and authenticated access to corporate information systemsIntegration with other connected systems to provide comprehensive solutions e.g., Agresso, WebSURF, ExamSURF, HR systems etc

User Base

Staff, Students and other partnersMust have access to relevant, reliable and secure Information Technology resourcesUser view will be via a suitable Platform providing access to common resources and all necessary teaching, research and administration resources

ICT Infrastructure RoadmapThird Building Block For strategic provision and development

The ICT Infrastructure Roadmap identifies the proposed work programmes required to meet the aspirations of the ICT Infrastructure Strategy. The work programmes cover a three year planning horizon i.e., the current financial year and the two following financial years. The roadmap for each year identifies all areas of strategic activity as well as areas where

specific funding is required.