SUNYConnect Advisory Council
Minutes November 1, 2000 

Members present:  Laura Cohen, Randy Gadikian, Carey 
Hatch, Eleanor Heishman (Chair), Mac Holmes, Tom 
Neiss, Pam Peters, Mike Pisa, Janet Potter, Larry 
Randall, Judy Sikora , Maureen Zajkowski

On motion from Randy Gadikian the Minutes of 
September 27, 2000 were approved. 

Meeting with Provost Salins
Prior to the meeting the Council met with Provost 
Salins to update him about the progress of 
SUNYConnect and discuss issues.  The Provost 
suggested that SAC work on a plan for sharing 
resources with academic libraries across the state.  
Other issues discussed with the Provost included the 
need for a network policy, shared storage facilities, 
a Research initiative for SUNY and how SUNYConnect 
could fit into that, coordinated collection 
development to diminish redundancy and gaps in SUNY 
library collections, and the need for more funding 
for databases.  

Following the meeting with Dr. Salins, Mary Alice 
Lynch, Executive Director of NYLINK, joined SAC for a 
working lunch where the group discussed issues 
related to creating a broad coalition of academic 
libraries to take advantage of resource sharing and 
ways NYLINK could support SUNYConnect. 

Membership
Prior to our meeting with Dr. Salins, Chris Haile had 
reported that there is no word yet on a SUBOA 
representative.

Software and Hardware Contract Updates
Carey Hatch reported that the contract with Ex Libris 
has been signed.  There is a snag in the hardware 
contract related to the expiration of a state 
contract. The OLIS staff is working with Ex Libris 
and the pilot sites on configurations and ways to 
standardize, as much as possible, on the equipment.

Implementation updates
Maureen Zajkowski reported on the schedule for kick-
off meetings with the pilot sites.  Fredonia hopes to 
be in production by January 2001 with training in 
November and December.  Oswego and TC3 plan to bring 
up the system by the end of spring semester. The 
three NOTIS sites are hoping to be ready for summer 
2001.

Database Survey Status
Larry Randall reported that only four or five 
campuses have not responded.  The results are being 
compiled and should be ready soon to be sent out by 
email to SAC members.

SUNYNet Update
No report 

Old Business
Network Requirements for SUNYConnect
The Council began discussing the network requirements 
for SUNYConnect with an exploration of our basic 
assumptions, based on a draft presented by Carey 
Hatch and Tom Neiss.  We agreed that we would try to 
focus on characteristics needed, with a variety of 
options, rather than mandating one solution.  
Consensus was reached that SAC was willing to make 
recommendations regarding wide area networking and 
local area networking (for multi campus server sites 
only) related to SUNYConnect.   We discussed whether 
we should set requirements or make recommendations.  
We agreed to postpone that decision until we 
establish the language. We went over a series of 
options for network service characteristics and 
agreed to the following:

				Public Access			
		Staff Access
Performance	Best Effort for Remote, By Design for on 
campus		By Design
Security			Authorized				
	Authorized
Availability			Anywhere			
		Anywhere

Carey Hatch and Tom Neiss will devise a proposal for 
the next steps in developing the network requirements 
for SUNYConnect.

Implementation Survey review of results  
Larry Randall asked if there were any questions about 
the survey results from last spring that had been 
distributed prior to the meeting by email.  We 
discussed whether we should re-survey either the 
entire system or wait to see if a sub-set (perhaps by 
region) could be chosen for a new survey.  It was 
agreed that we would discuss this at the next meeting 
as part of the discussion about the parameters for 
the selection of sites.

Parameters for the selection of sites to implement 
ALEPH after the pilot phase
Postponed until the next meeting

New Business

Policy on LMS implementation and database access
There has been an assumption that if a library was in 
the SUNYConnect project it had to be all or nothing, 
that is, a library couldn't choose to participate in 
the databases but not the library management system. 
Is this a policy we should formalize?  We decided 
that the elements pertinent to the issue are 
databases, the library management system, and shared 
storage.  We discussed whether it was possible to 
have a base fee to cover basic SUNYConnect membership 
and then pay for other services beyond that. For 
example base service could include the LMS and core 
databases and additional options could include 
EZProxy, Information Literacy, and additional 
databases.  We agreed to have Carey Hatch craft some 
language to send out for our electronic vote.

The meeting adjourned at 3:05 PM. 
Recorded by Janet Potter, secretary.

The next meeting is December 6th in Utica at 10 AM.
Approved December 6, 2000