THE CAPTAIN'S CHAIR

John Hooper, Executive Director of Administrative Information Systems, CITC

Project Management Practices at the University of North Texas

As many of you realize, the Administrative Information Systems (AIS) teams within CITC, as well as the other divisions of CITC, do hundreds of projects each year in support of the mission of the university.  Most of these projects are small but some are very large.  Significant university resources, both human and financial, from both CITC and the functional areas, are committed to these projects.  These efforts have a significant impact on the delivery of services to our constituents – students, faculty, staff, alumni, donors and the community.

Yet despite the importance of these projects and the resources of the university involved in their delivery, UNT has not had standards, consistent practices or policies for prioritization and execution of information technology (IT) projects.   New requirements from the state’s Department of Information Resources require that the university develop a project management practice.  The elements of this practice will include:

1. Demand management – capturing requests for IT projects
2. Portfolio management – making decisions about which projects consume scarce UNT resources
3. Project management – measuring progress and delivery of IT projects

Over the next few months proposals will be coming forth from CITC through the Information Resources Council (IRC) to address these elements.   The first of these proposals, titled “Information Technology Advisory Committees at UNT,” addresses the overall governance structure for information technology resources.  It outlines the role of a new council named the Information Technology Council that will replace the IRC.  Additionally, the proposal details the design for a senior level Information Resources Steering Committee and the role of existing IRC program groups, such as the EIS Program Management Planning Group (PMG).  Based on the proposal, the roles and responsibilities of these groups will change in addition to their composition.  The proposal may be reviewed in its entirety at:

IT Advisory Committees at UNT (draft)

This proposal will be considered in the IRC meeting on Tuesday, March 11, 2008.  Please provide your feedback to your representative on the IRC or to me by the end of the week of March 3rd.

Also under consideration is a policy document titled “Project Management Policy.” The State policy titled Texas Administrative Code, chapter 216 requires that public institutions of higher education in Texas have a policy that communicates an institution-wide approach to project management practices. It also states that those institutions manage information technology practices in a manner that includes documented and repeatable methods that the university uses to apply knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to satisfy project activity requirements. The proposed policy document is intended to satisfy the state’s requirement for such a policy.  This proposed policy provides definitions relating to projects at UNT.  It will provide a classification system to be used in determining the level of management that must approve a project and the project management rigor required for the execution of that project.  This proposed policy may be reviewed at:

Project Management Policy (draft)

Another draft document, the “UNT Project Management Handbook,” describes the project management practices to be employed for IT projects at UNT, the project approval structure that defines responsibility for approving projects based on their size (as determined by the Project Classification procedure in the “Project Management Policy”), and the project management rigor required based on the classification of the project.  This handbook is consistent with the Texas Project Delivery Framework promulgated by the Texas Department of Information Resources.  Please pay particular attention to Appendix A which describes the Project Approval Structure and Appendix B which prescribes various levels of Project Management rigor depending on effort, complexity, etc.  The approval structure will tie closely to the committees and roles described in the overall “Information Technology Advisory Committees Proposal.”  The draft handbook may be reviewed at:

UNT Project Management Handbook (draft)

Both the “Project Management Policy” and the “UNT Project Management Handbook” are under review by the Standards and Policy Planning Group which is a standing committee of the IRC.  This group is chaired by Tim Christian.  Please provide feedback to Tim with a copy to me.  These will not be discussed in next Tuesday’s (March 11th) IRC meeting so there is more time to consider your feedback.  We will also discuss all of these project management proposals in the EIS Users Meeting scheduled for Thursday, April 10, 2008.

In a closely related effort, the Project Management Office within CITC is implementing Microsoft’s Project Server and Portfolio Server to provide support for these practices and policies.

Although these efforts will not change the quality of the products delivered or the services provided by CITC, they will change some aspects of how we perform our responsibilities.  In addition to meeting state requirements, these changes should provide for more effective execution of projects, more structured and appropriate approval and prioritization of projects consistent with their cost and impact on the university, more transparency about project prioritization and delivery, and more effective use of resources.

For this to be effective and at an appropriate level of structure that meets the goals of the project management practice without being overly burdensome, the university needs your feedback on these proposals. As I stated earlier, the first proposal, “Information Technology Advisory Committees at UNT,” will be considered in the IRC meeting on Tuesday, March 11th. Please provide your feedback on this proposal to your representative on the IRC or to me by the end of the week of March 3rd.

NEWS ROOM

PeopleSoft Financials Upgrade to 9.0 Begins

The University of North Texas System (UNTS) is upgrading from PeopleSoft’s Financials 8.4 to version 9.0. This upgrade gives UNTS new and enhanced functionality and allows for continued support from Oracle/PeopleSoft of the Financials applications until 2012. Some of the new features will enhance reporting capabilities and make use of newer XML technology. PeopleSoft is also delivering new features to enhance performance, including system monitoring and the ability to archive older transactional data to free up valuable data storage space.

The project is a collaborative effort between UNT and HSC administrative functional support areas and UNT’s Computing and Information Technology Center (CITC). The upgrade team consists of several CITC technical teams and functional representatives supporting financial reporting and accounting, budgets, E-procurement, purchasing and payments, assets, grants and projects, as well as the support of multiple UNTS internal departments and external entities that interface with the Financials system.

EIS Data Linked to Eagle Alert System

UNT has implemented an emergency information system for the campus community that is supported with data from EIS. The messaging system is named Eagle Alert and allows UNT administrators to quickly contact students and employees by phone about emergency situations affecting the safety and well being of people on and around the campus. The system also can send text messages to cell phones if a person grants the system permission.

The Eagle Alert system only notifies currently enrolled students and employees of the University of North Texas and the UNT Dallas Campus (Systems Center) - former students and employees do not receive messages. The UNT Health Science Center is expected to go-live on February 29th with a similar system named Red Alert.

Payroll Change for Direct Deposit Statements

Beginning with the March 3, 2008, paychecks, the Payroll Office will no longer print the direct deposit statements for most employees.

Employees can log into the MyUNT Portal (http://my.unt.edu) to view or print their earning statement. Only employees who receive their paycheck by direct deposit are effected by this change.

To view and print a copy of their direct deposit statement, employees should follow these steps:

1. Login to http://my.unt.edu.
2. Under System Login, enter your EUID and enterprise password.
3. Click the Sign In button.
4. Select the Employee tab.
5. In the Human Resource – UNT panel, under Payroll, Taxes, and Salary, click the View Paycheck link.
6. Choose the paycheck date that you want to view/print.
7. To print your statement, click the print button on the toolbar that appears.

CITC Student Records Developers Busy With System Enhancements

The Student Records System Development Team (SRSD), lead by Linda Wallace, has been busy supporting student administration efforts in cooperation with the UNT Registrar’s Office. The PeopleSoft 8.9 upgrade (completed in November 2007) delivered significant improvements in student and faculty self-service features. The fabulous new Student Center and Faculty Center accessed through the MyUNT and MyHSC portals provide new functionality to students and faculty. Several students have mentioned to the editor of theEnterprise that the new student center is “wonderful and easy to use” and “makes the registration process much easier.”

During the 3rd quarter of the fiscal year, the SRSD team will be implementing a new interactive DARS Web Audit application that works in conjunction with DARS. DARS is the degree audit application that interfaces with PeopleSoft. It provides degree audits to show students their progress toward completing a degree. Additionally, it provides academic advisors with the information they need in order to advise the students. This new application is going to be accessed through the Student Center, and will allow students to run their own interactive degree audits.

A new product named Degree Completion Planner (DCP) from Miami University in Ohio (who also brought us DARS) is on the horizon for the Registrar’s Office. The Registrar's office is planning to purchase this product in the near future; the SRSD team will participate with EIS users in Student Records to implement and support DCP. This new product will provide students with a way to plan ahead for the courses needed to complete their degree and allow the university to strategically plan for and provide the courses that students need. 

Last year the SRSD team sadly had to deal with the death of a team member, Howard Shaw. He is being fondly remembered, however, in the beginning of March during a tree dedication at the University. The tree is a bur oak and will have a granite plaque next to it in memory of Howard. The tree was paid for by donations from the university community.

New EIS User Work Area

Walter Bowen at the new work area.

Room RP 203, which is part of the physical space occupied by the Computing and Information Technology Center (CITC) at the Research Park, is undergoing revision. The 22 “cubed” work areas in RP 203 that provided EIS users with work space at the Research Park have been dismantled.  The UNT School of Library and Information Science (SLIS) is scheduled to begin construction for their college in the open area adjacent to where the cubicles formerly existed. The space the cubicles occupied will undergo construction to build additional offices needed to accommodate the growth of CITC.

Ten of the “cubed” work areas, however, have been relocated to a beautifully remodeled room labeled RP 245. Though there are fewer “cube” work areas, the conference area has floor to ceiling windows giving users a breathtaking view of the prairies northeast of the Research Park. Walter Bowen, Associate Director/Director Systems Admission, is already working in the new area. Walter is heading up the effort to implement CRM for undergraduates.  The area is available for EIS business users and consultants working on EIS projects in cooperation with CITC. Information regarding the use of the room can be directed to Allen Bradley (allen.bradley@unt.edu), AIS Business and Process Management Manager.

EIS Influential Presence at Oracle/PeopleSoft Conference

The Alliance 2008 conference is an annual event for all higher education, government, and public sector users of Oracle applications. The Alliance conference is organized and managed by the Higher Education User Group (www.heug.org). The 11th annual event for HEUG is to be held March 10-13, 2008.

Numerous UNT and HSC technical and functional staff have been invited to share information and case studies about EIS for the past five years at the conference due to their level of expertise and innovative solutions in enterprise system fields. This year UNTS and EIS will be represented by the following topics and presenters:

• “Encumbering Salaries and Benefits,” co-presented by Rong Wang (CITC) and Jean Bush (Budgets) -- provides an overview of UNT's solution to encumber/disencumber salaries and benefits
• “Budget Reports,” co-presented by Will Senn (CITC) and Jean Bush (Budgets) -- describes and demonstrates UNT's solution for budget reporting using Cognos
• “Incorporating Cognos Reporting into PeopleSoft at UNT,” presented by Ginny Richards (CITC)
• “Writing Usable User Documentation,” presented by Cathy Gonzalez (CITC) – workshop highlighting best practices for trainers and writers creating documents and electronic help for Oracle/PeopleSoft products
• "From PeopleSoft Queries to Oracle Discoverer, Explore the Possibilities,” co-presented by Juana Castillo (HSC), Dona Smith (HSC), and Bob Woelfel (HSC)

SUCCESS GALLERY

Ask UNT Online Help

A graphical link titled “Ask UNT” is now available at the top of every page in the MyUNT Portal. The Ask UNT clickable graphic area was initiated by Troy Johnson, Associate Vice-President for Enrollment Management. Portal users can click the link and access the Ask UNT searchable database to find answers to questions about Undergraduate, Graduate and International Admissions; Financial Aid and Scholarships; Student Accounting; Registrar; and multiple other topics. Students can also register with Ask UNT to ask questions and track answers and associated document references. The Ask UNT database is administered by Ed Turney, Associate Director of Financial Aid.

Management Certification Report System Streamlines Expenditure Data Tracking and Certification

A Management Certification Report system is now available in EIS. The system is designed to provide a certification process for actual expenditure data. Institutional managers are able to view their expenditures during the fiscal year and verify that the expenditures look correct on a monthly basis. Individuals can also view their expenditures and revenues.

The report consists of a responsibility page that displays to show the department ID or project ID holder the expenses they are responsible for certifying. A prompt page is available with a variety of criteria to select for filtering the report by business unit or budget period, and the summary data itself. Once a manager has had the opportunity to review the data, there is a button on the page that allows them to certify the results.

The system was created with the goal of helping managers to have a more convenient and efficient way to identify when and where their funds are being used. The work to design and develop the system was a collaborative effort between the EIS Finance, Administration and Budgeting, and Business Intelligence Team; the EIS Data Warehouse and Finance teams; and the UNT Budget office.

TECHNICAL CAFE

What is a SAN?

A SAN (Storage Area Network) is a network specifically dedicated to the task of transporting data for storage and retrieval. SAN architectures are alternatives to storing data on disks directly attached to servers or storing data on Networked Attached Storage (NAS) devices which are connected through general purpose networks. SANs are traditionally connected over fiber channel networks.

UNT’s SAN is integral to the performance of EIS as well as distance learning and numerous other systems. It provides flexible (easily configured) and large amounts of storage space at performance levels only dreamed about a few years ago.

Compellent manufactures SAN storage systems with many features that make provisioning and most other tasks very efficient. Many tasks on numerous systems prior to Compellent had to be managed by support technicians or were not available at all. The idea being that making management easier and making the system more flexible lowers the cost of ownership. Some of the tasks/features of the Compellent systems are:

• Data Progression™ automatically classifies and migrates data to the optimum tier of storage based on usage, allowing users to retain frequently accessed data on high-performance storage and store infrequently accessed data on lower cost storage.
• Thin Provisioning only consumes physical disk when data is written, as opposed to allocating capacity upfront.
•  Dynamic Capacity™ cuts overall storage expenditures, increases availability and boosts performance.
• Data Instant Replay™ creates an unlimited number of space efficient copies, called Replays, to provide extremely fast recovery from any type of data hazard while consuming minimal storage space.

Remote Instant Replay™ delivers affordable, verifiable IP-based replication to multiple business locations over long distances using low-cost lines, creating an unlimited combination of point in time copies between primary and remote data centers.

EIS FAST FACTS

Spring Registration Statistics

This quarter we take a look at the technical side of Spring 2008 registration.

EIS Servers Supporting Registration:

• 6 web servers
• 7 application servers
• 2 database servers
• 3 batch servers

The peak days for number of users logged into myUNT were Monday, January 7th and Monday, January 14th.

January 7th, 2008 - peak time was 6 p.m. with 3,401 users
(compared to Monday, January 8, 2007 peak time was also 6 p.m. with 2,335 users)

January 14th, 2008 - peak time was 10:00 a.m. with 3,789 users
(compared to Monday, January 15, 2007 peak time was 10 p.m. with 2,428 users)

TRAINING LAB

EIS 8.9 Navigation Training

The upgrade to PeopleSoft 8.9 added significant improvements to navigation in the EIS administrative web-based interface. Follow this link to access the User Manual for EIS 8.9 Navigation.

Training Calendar

EIS Timekeeper Training is now conducted on a one-on-one basis, and this can be organized directly with Human Resources (565-3995)

EIS ePro Training Calendar - includes ePro Coordinator Classes & PPS Travel

Budget Reports Training (contact BudOffice@fis.admin.unt.edu)

EIS Training on Blackboard Vista

EIS training for Query Manager 8.9 is currently being developed for Blackboard Vista (formerly WebCT Vista). Query training for Financial Services is available online for faculty or staff new to Financials 8.4.

Introduction to Query for EIS (FS) (requires approval by Associate Vice President for Finance & Business Affairs, and Controller)