SUNYConnect Advisory Council
Minutes February 21, 2001
Approved March 27, 2001


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

Absent:  Mac Holmes, Richard Mann 

Guests:  Mary Alice and Peg Palmiere from NYLINK and Nancy Van Deusen 
from SUNY Cobleskill

The Minutes of January 17, 2001 were approved as distributed. 

Old Business

     a.  Document Delivery 
          Mary-Alice Lynch reported that NYLINK has begun an exploration of 
Document Delivery options for SUNYConnect, including looking at RFP’s from 
other consortia such as OhioLink and INCOLSA. At this stage, she wanted to 
check with SAC on several assumptions that are central to moving forward with 
a proposal.  To the question of how the program will be funded—centrally or 
campus-by-campus, Carey responded that the program is included in the 
SUNYConnect financial plan so would be paid out of central funds that come 
from the campuses and other sources.  Mary Alice asked whether we had 
considered which was more important—low cost or availability of advanced 
features such as tracking and delivery on demand.  Other consortia using 
document delivery experience very low rates of loss—.003% per year.   

Other questions concerned timing and how campuses would be added (all at 
once or phased in with the migration or begin with a pilot). How does the 
external ILL delivery (to libraries outside SUNY) fit in? It was agreed that SAC 
would like to see a summary of best practices to determine what our options are, 
as well as an outline of what policy issues we will need to consider. Carey will 
work with Mary Alice to get implementation questions answered so that 
NYLINK can design the RFP.

Mary Alice has communicated our plans to the State Library in order to keep 
them informed since a statewide delivery system is part of Regents Commission 
plan.  Implementation of that part of the plan is not even on the horizon.  They 
aren’t as ready as we are to move forward—this could be a pilot for a larger 
statewide system.  It was suggested that Pi square might be interested in 
participating in such a pilot when we were ready to move beyond SUNY.  
 
Mary Alice and Peg Palmiere left at 10:30.


b. Implementation Report 

Maureen Zajkowski reported that Fredonia is live as of January 31st

Maureen reported on some questions that have arisen during this stage of 
implementation.
Computing people at server sites say that there needs to be much more of a 
knowledge transfer about what changes are being made.  Ex Libris has remote 
access and takes care of fixes and updates without necessarily communicating 
with computing staff.    This points out a need for better communication and a 
clear understanding of who does what.  In addition, training needs to be 
streamlined and more focused on SUNY-specific implementation.   There is 
concern about not keeping to established timetables, which will impact 
production dates for pilots and the full migration schedule.  A meeting is 
planned with Ex Libris to work out some solutions.

Maureen reported that OLIS is working with Footprints, a Web-based problem 
tracking application used mostly by help desks.  OLIS plans to use it to track the 
implementation and to share the documents being created for each pilot.  The 
plan is to eventually make this application available to all in SUNY.  

OLIS staff are being trained in UNIX and ALEPH.  OLIS will work with 
NYLINK or the Training Center to offer similar training for library staff out in 
the field.  A test server is being ordered for OLIS staff for developing training 
programs and learning the system.  The call for the Access Management 
Working Group has gone out.  That group will initially focus on the union 
catalog web interface and discuss guidelines associated with universal 
borrowing.  

OLIS has asked SUNYLA to help get a SUNY-based ALEPH users group off 
the ground.  It is expected that the users group will eventually be separate from 
SUNYLA.  The users group will provide SUNY input into the ALEPH 
enhancements process and identify representatives to the North American Users 
Group.

Randy Gadikian asked if ITEC could play a role in operations support.  Carey is 
in conversation with ITEC about support.  

In response to a question from Pam Peters, Carey reported that the SICAS 
Center is developing an Aleph interface for Banner.  Interfaces with other 
administrative systems will need to be done locally.  

Eleanor asked when the Access Management Working Group will conclude 
work on the union catalog interface.  Maureen stated that it would likely be the 
end of calendar year.  She felt that January would be the soonest we could do 
shared access which will impact the timing of the pilot of the delivery system.  

 
     c.  Host regions and migration time-lines 

Carey Hatch and Maureen Zajkowski presented the following assumptions about 
the proposed migration schedule.  The proposed schedule is based on 
assumptions that:
? We will build on existing server sites.
? There will be an initial focus on LAIP sites to build on Ex Libris 
experience with MultiLIS conversions.
? We will include non-LAIP sites in later timeframes to allow Ex Libris 
to focus on them while OLIS continues with LAIP campuses.
? There will be regional implementations to facilitate sharing of training 
and migration process management.
? Migrations will be staggered within anticipated migration time periods.
? Campuses will need to be flexible with Switch to Production (STP) 
dates.
? The proposed migration schedule is conservative.
? It will be necessary to revisit schedules often to re-evaluate the number 
of campuses that can be migrated and other factors including readiness.
? Stony Brook (West campus) will support HSC Stony Brook and they 
will go as one campus, informing OLIS about the appropriate 
timeframe for HSC migration.

The proposed migration schedule was presented and discussed, focusing on the 
issue of how many server sites are needed and the parameters to choose them.  It 
was pointed out that campuses may have a problem committing to be a server 
site with so little “real” information.

Although most campuses want to move as quickly as possible, we need to be 
cognizant of how much OLIS and Ex Libris can do.  There are cost savings 
associated with closing down LAIP server sites.

It was agreed that it would be advantageous to have all the May-December 
campuses be part of the Oswego server group.  It was further agreed that OLIS 
should initiate formal discussion with potential server sites, including all 
university centers and Oswego.      

We agreed to uncouple the server site choice from the migration timeframe. 
Tom stated that regionalizing server sites is very important because of culture 
(more frequent communication and getting to know each other, sharing 
resources, computer staff communication) rather than technology.  The point 
was made that if we had adequate bandwidth we might only need a few servers.  

The Council agreed that SAC and OLIS would begin exploring the migration 
strategy as presented by Carey and Maureen, while realizing that the timeframes 
are optimistic.  OLIS will begin contacting the next phase campuses to see 
whether are able to move at this time.

Carey will prepare a final version of the migration plan for an email vote and 
once approved, the assumptions and the proposed migration schedule will be 
sent out on the SUNYLA and SCLD listservs and posted on the OLIS web site.


     d.  SliCAT Report and Elsevier Meeting 
Larry Randall reported that SliCat has not met; a meeting is scheduled for 
February 26.  

Larry has drafted an electronic database project plan with timeframe and major 
milestones for review by SliCAT.

Elsevier held a meeting with CUNY, NYLINK and major SUNY stakeholders in 
January. The SUNY stakeholders were very interested in the proposed contract. 
Larry hopes to hammer out final terms this week.   Carey reported that he and 
Mary Alice had discussions with Elsevier about a statewide initiative for 
expanding the contract to private higher education institutions but it created too 
little benefit and too much financial commitment for us to proceed at this time.  
We will continue to look for similar opportunities.  CUNY as a whole doesn’t 
have the money to cover the content fee so some of the campuses may buy in 
but the whole system won’t.
Until our negotiations are concluded we don’t know whether non-subscribers 
will be included in the SUNY contract.

The HarpWeek contract is waiting to be signed.


e. Network Report 
Tom Neiss reported that the letter from SAC in support of the Internet2 for 
SUNY Strategy has gone to the Provost.  ALIS has had meetings with senior 
SUNY management including
the Chancellor.  There are no obvious objections to the proposed Internet2
strategy, although there were some concerns about NYSERnet, which 
NYSERnet
has since addressed.  NYSERnet would be the focal point for expanding the
infrastructure to cover many other campuses beyond the R1 institutions
currently involved in Internet2.    

There is a SUNYConnect network collaboration meeting scheduled for March 
1st
with the pilot sites (Binghamton, Buffalo Fredonia Oswego Stony Brook TC3).
Computer, networking and librarian staff will participate to determine the
networking (LAN/WAN) requirements for each site that will ensure adequate
communication between hosts and nodes and the union catalog.  This meeting
is an attempt to address for the group and for individual partnerships
solutions to problems and issues

4.  Financial Plan 
Carey Hatch will send out updates to the financial plan prior to each SAC 
meeting.  We are generally on the right track—we have over estimated in some 
areas but underestimated in others.  

Nancy Van Deusen was present as president of SUNY Library Support Center 
Advisory Board, which has oversight of the LAIP IFR.  The LAIP IFR will be 
used to support LAIP libraries.  The LAIP IFR is the most significant part of the 
contingency fund in the SUNYConnect financial plan.  Carey reported that using 
the LAIP IFR could give us the flexibility to buy electronic content, since the 
availability of $4 million in capital money eliminated the need to use the IFR for 
LAIP campus hardware and software licenses.  Campuses will pay LAIP bills 
until migration and then will pay SUNYConnect bills. There is no “set aside” in 
the SUNYConnect plan to create a fund for future needs.  Moving forward, 
looking at LAIP money as SUNYConnect money is appropriate if other funds 
are available to meet the intent of the LAIP set aside.  

The Council discussed how to publicize the financial plan; it was agreed that we 
will update the OLIS web site with the information about the financial plan 
shortly after June 30th each year.

5.  New Business

a. Meeting with SUNY Business Officers 
Dick Mann has suggested we update the Business Officers on 
SUNYConnect.  Eleanor and/or Pam will work with Carey on the 
presentation.  

b. Faculty Senate 
Carey reported that he and Chris Haile did a presentation for the Faculty Senate   
Vince Aceto stated that this is a model for the way SUNY administration can 
work with campuses.  The Faculty Senate requested a representative on SAC.  
Pam moved that we ask the Faculty Senate if they want to name a representative 
to the SUNYConnect Advisory Council.  Judy Sikora seconded. The motion 
carried.  Carey will talk to the current president, Joe Flynn.  

c. Trustee Bernard Conners
Trustee Bernard Conners called Carey to say he is Chair of the new Board of 
Trustees library committee (may be a subcommittee of the Technology 
Committee).  He has met with Carey and also had a tour of the Albany campus 
library.   We agreed that we would send him agendas for SAC meetings and 
offer to work with him and the committee in any way possible.

d. April meeting of Library Directors
The Council discussed a proposed meeting of public and private academic 
library directors tentatively scheduled prior to the Council of Library Directors 
meeting in April.   The purpose of the meeting is to move forward the Provost’s 
proposed coalition of public and private academic libraries in New York State to 
advance cost avoidance and advocacy for electronic databases.  Questions were 
raised about the timing and about the relationship to a similar dinner meeting 
arranged by the Provost with representatives from public and private higher 
education libraries.   The feeling was expressed that SUNY should investigate 
this avenue but that perhaps such a large-scale meeting would be a difficult 
venue for crafting a plan. 

6.  Next meeting:  March 27, 2001
We will meet in Albany and the agenda will include a discussion of whether we 
should establish guidelines for privacy.  Trustee Conners will be invited to 
attend.      

The meeting was adjourned at 2:38 PM.

Respectfully submitted,

Janet Potter, Secretary