Oxford University ITSSC98 programme

St Catherine's College Thursday, 25 June 1998 `Towards the Millennium'

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Programme

8:30 - 9:10		Registration	tea & coffee
Session 1 9:10-10:40
	9:10 - 9:15	Introduction -- Gerard Robinson, ITSSG Chairman
	Chair: Alex Reid, OUCS
	9:15 - 9:45 9:45 - 10:15 10:15 - 10:40	A retrospective -- Joe Stoy, Comlab & Chairman of IT Committee The Implications of Dearing to IT - an overview -- Joyce Martin of the CTI will give a short presentation followed members of the panel offering their opinions of likely implication and hopefully some questions from delegates. Panel members: Joyce Martin, Martin Price, Alex Reid, Gerard Robinson, Joe Stoy, John Tuck. Distributed Computing -- an Oxbridge perspective! - Sue Brooks, Assistant Director OUCS.
10:40 - 11:10		Break	tea & coffee
Session 2 11:10 - 12:30	Chair: Robert Taylor, Queens & Chairman Colleges ITUG
	11:10 - 11:30 11:30 - 12:00 12:00 - 12:30	Dating the Year 2000 -- Charles Curran, OUCS Early History of Computing in Oxford -- Linda Hayes, St. Cross "Gizmos of the world unite" - Java into the new millennium Rob Bamforth, Sun Microsystems (Java Business Development Mgr)
12:30 - 13:45		LUNCH
Session 3 13:45 - 15:15	Workshops
	13:45 - 14:30 14:35 - 15:20	Workshop session A Workshop session B
	15:20 - 15:50	Break	tea & coffee
	15:50 - 16:35	Workshop session C
Session 4 16:40 - 17:45	16:40 - 17:45	ITSSG - discussion & ratification of reps.; Initial survey results; Invited Questions
18:00 - 19:00		Reception & "Birds of a Feather" meetings	Drinks
19:30 -		Mansfield Road Club	Buffet

Workshops

ID no.	Topic/theme	Presenter
1	Web Searching	Grazyna Cooper
2	Career development: Certification and Accreditation	Jane Littlehales
3	The changing role of IT: resources and support	Helen Beetham
4	Document Styles & markup	Lou Burnard
5	Athens 3 *CANCELLED*	Jenny Sykes
6	ADSM Version 3 Update	Sheelagh Treweek & Tom Anstey
7	CD-ROMs and On-Line Resources: The Datasets Nightmare	Stuart Lee
8	New Data Protection legislation - the latest position.	Martin Price
9	Advanced Web Applications, & Using Acrobat for Web Publishing	Thaddeus Lipinski James Dore
10	OxTalent - 'Producing an Online Lecture Course Tutorial'	Tonia Cope Bowley, Karl Harrison
11	Security	Pete Biggs
12	Libraries	Dave Price Simon Thomson
13	Help Desk Software	Brevan Miles
14	Video Conferencing	Peter Robinson
15	Windows - the next few years	Matthew Dovey
16	Student E-mail	Malcolm Beattie.
17	Professional Development for IT Support Staff	Carol Bateman
18	Life Long Learning	Jonathan Darby
19	Disasters & Recovery	Stuart Sharp
20	Network Developments	Gavin Litchfield

Workshop Details

Workshop		Synopsis
1	Web Searching	One of the problems with the World Wide Web is that there is too much information available. Furthermore, this information is utterly disorganized. Often we know that the information we need is there; but we do not know how to find it. This workshop will cover various aspects of using search engines to find resources on the Web. It will look at their different features and strategies one might adopt for searching. It will also outline some differences between major search engines and indexes/directories.
2	Career development: Certification and Accreditation	How can you gain recognition for your skills, experience and knowledge? What organisations exist to support and encourage career development for IT Support Staff? How can you get certified for Microsoft, Novell, etc. without paying a fortune or taking many days off work? What generic certification is available? Is training worthwhile even if you cannot complete the entire course or do not want to take an exam? What are OUCS, the IT Support Staff Group and the IT Education and Training Group doing to help Support Staff with training and certification? What existing courses, training materials, seminars, workshops, etc. are there? Will user certification schemes ease the load on support staff? What changes, improvements and additions would you like to see? Answers at this workshop! Please bring an open mind, enthusiasm and your questions.
3	The changing role of IT: resources and support	The rapid development of new technologies as well as the changing demands placed on the higher education system have meant changes in the role of IT in our universities. With the convergence of technologies has come a new emphasis on integrated information management - in the classroom and library as well as in university administration. Students and staff have access to new online resources, new means of collaboration, new communications tools, new forms of assessment and new means of delivering coursework. None of these developments can be harnessed, however, without appropriate support. As well as their traditional role in the maintenance of infrastructure and the provision of basic training, IT support staff are now expected to assist with staff development and student induction across a wide range of skills, resource discovery (traditionally the province of the librarian), the maintenance of online learning materials, and even the development of new materials for teaching and learning. IT support is devolved among colleges, faculties and specialist units, where there is an increasing demand for specialised knowledge and skills. This presentation looks at the national trends and considers what support services and resources are available to help staff adapt to the changing demands of their role.
4	Document Styles & markup	Life after HTML As HTML-n succeeds HTML-n+1 with yet another set of mutually-incompatible browser-dependent variations, loud cheers are in order for the activities of the W3C's XML Working Group. This body, on which all the major Web vendors are represented, announced its manageable subset of SGML, known as the eXtensible Markup Language or XML, over a year ago, and has since gone on to define both an eXtensible Linking Language (for multimedia hypertexts) and an eXtensible Style Language (for rendering them). Together these enable us to start "weaving a better web" (Byte cover story, March 1998) right away. In this talk, I'll introduce the basic notions underlying XML, describe some of the tools already available for using it, and make some speculations about how it might enable us to transform our current ways of handling textual -- and other -- information in digital form, both on the Web and elsewhere.
5	Athens 3	Unfortunately this workshop has been *cancelled*
6	ADSM Version 3 Update	In January the ADSM server software was updated to Version 3 which had been long awaited for the performance enhancements it included. Version 3 client software is now available for most platforms. The workshop will include an overview of the Version 3 highlights, performance enhancements and the new GUI interface. Hints on upgrading existing clients will be given and there will be a demonstration of the new client features.
7	CD-ROMs and On-Line Resources: The Datasets Nightmare	This talk will outline the current situation with the University's networked datasets (e.g. CD-ROMs and On-Line Resources). It will briefly discuss the problems of buying in these datasets for University-wide use, show how the Datasets Working Party is trying to tackle these, and offer a chance to people to air their views about previous decisions/problems, and improvements for the future.
8	New Data Protection legislation - the latest position.	Parliament is currently debating legislation to introduce the European directive on data protection. This will replace the Data Protection Act 1984. Martin Price will give a progress report and indicate in general terms how the University is likely to be affected by the new law.
9	Advanced Web Applications, & Using Acrobat for Web Publishing	Part 1. T.L. How to progress from simple static web design, using web extras that are useful. Designing web pages Use Templates if possible Style Sheets On the horizon: XGML Adding extra functionality: Frames - create a dynamic home page (eg display latest additions to a database) Simple Javascript (eg cancel button for requests, updating web pages on the fly.) Plugins: Shockwave, RealAudio, QuickTime Using PDF for document delivery - next part of talk by James Dore. Finish off by demonstrating a simple web based email service. Part 2: S. D. Course aims To demonstrate the ease with which Acrobat documents (PDF Files) can be used as the basis of a web site. To demonstrate how existing documents can be displayed directly in the browser, formatting intact, without having to `downsample' them to HTML. To demonstrate methods of quickly creating PDF files from several packages (Word, and PageMaker 6/6.5 in particular) To demonstrate the neat features of the PDF format, including the built-in multimedia and forms features.
10	OxTalent	The talk will be a demonstration for IT support staff on how to go about producing an online lecture course. The idea will be that a member of academic staff would like to have a course on the web and has come to the IT support staff member for help. The tutorial will focus on what the lecturer should be expected to supply i.e. word processed documents and electronic figures. Then how the IT support staff could approach the task of producing an online lecture course, for example: structure and layout of the online course, design and content of web pages, copyright issues and external links. The tutorial will look at the process by following the conversion of a collection of overheads from a science lecture course to the end online web site. Of course this would be one approach, another would be that the IT support staff would teach the lecturer how to produce the web course him or herself.
11	Securing your network. (or "what you should have done before you came to this conference!")	This workshop will investigate the steps you should take to ensure that your network is secure. It will also cover what you should be telling your users to do to improve their security.
12	Oxford Libraries	The Oxford Libraries provide access on campus to a wide range of high-quality bibliographic reference and full-text databases. These are both secondary sources, such as indexes and abstracts, and primary sources, such as electronic journals. We will give an overview of what is available and the technology and interfaces used to access them, in particular OxLIP, the Oxford Libraries Information Platform.
13	Helpdesk Software	The Workshop will examine how OUCS site licensed helpdesk software is used to support OUCS Advisory services, and examine ways in which others may make use of it to support their own services.
14	An introduction to the University Video-conferencing service	Video-conferencing can provide very considerable economic benefits, as it enables people in different places to converse and share images without the time and expense associated with travelling to another location. The video-conferencing service at Oxford is an ISDN-based system that enables `dial-up' connection to any similar system elsewhere in the world. Although ISDN lines can be installed anywhere in the University there is a significant initial cost involved, and it is generally preferable to use one of several rooms in the University already equipped with ISDN to simplify the set-up and reduce costs. This workshop will show examples of video-conferencing and provide advice on procedure and etiquette with an outline of how the system is used by departments at Oxford.
15	Windows - the next few years	Microsoft is attempting to make Windows the architecture of choice across the whole range of computing devices from embedded systems through handheld PCs, through the desktop to the departmental and enterprise servers. In order to make Windows a feasible alternative to their competitor Microsoft are promising a large range of new technologies. Many of these will emerge in Windows 98 (due this summer) and Windows NT 5.0 (due later next year). The latter promises to be a large step from the current versions NT 4.0. This workshop will cover some of the technologies promised by Microsoft and examine the current state of these technologies. It will also cover the pertinent steps in migrating from Windows 95 and NT 4.0 to Windows 98 and NT 5.0.
16	Student E-mail	OUCS is setting up a new email server to provide reliable email access to the University. This talk will explain its goals, design and implementation and cover the various email services that it will provide.
17	Professional Development for IT Support Staff	This session is a repeat of the session given at ITSSC97. It will look briefly at the results of the training needs analysis done at ITSSC97. This is your chance to stand back and work out your training needs from a technical and personal point of view. We can then schedule courses where appropriate. I look forward to seeing you and helping to answer the following questions: What are your training needs? What is a training needs analysis? What are Professional Development Schemes?
18	Opportunities for Technology Assisted Lifelong Learning in Oxford
19	Disasters & Recovery
20	Network Developments	Recent and planned developments to the Oxford area network.

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