Present: Alan Miller, Tom Raymond, Dr. Ray Palmer, Kat Myers, Dr. Keith Krolick, Jesse Gomez, Dr. Bob Badgett, Dr. Barbara Covington, Gilbert Sosa, Anna Maloy, Jim Barrett
The chair, Dr. Ray Palmer, opened the meeting, and received approval of the March 26 minutes. Jim Barrett presented the webmaster's report. He said:- Server traffic rose 41 percent in March, to 1,047,888 page views.
- Migration to a new institutional web server was completed successfully on April 8.
- He added a customized page that lets users give feedback when they receive an "error 404" page, short for "page cannot be found." Mr. Barrett said the page was receiving an average of about 1,000 visits an hour. He said broken links alone do not account for the traffic, and he suspects random URLs generated and sent by servers infected with the Nimda worm may be causing the traffic. A network security scan will be conducted shortly, he said.
In old business, Gilbert Sosa reported on plans to present visitor maps of the campus in the new student and administration building. In February, the committee agreed to pursue improved maps of the campus. Mr. Sosa said a software product from Adobe, SVG Visual Building Search, would be used in the new building. The software displays floorplans, and can link employee names to their office numbers displayed on the floor maps. He said the information most likely would be linked to a database that tracked names and room numbers.
Dr. Covington said web maps should be designed to help visitors and staff, faculty, and students find buildings, proper parking areas, and rooms. Alan Miller said the existing building floor maps were developed with funding from the president's office. He said he knew of no funding for production of maps for use beyond those posted now in the buildings.
Dr. Covington suggested that a subgroup develop a university-wide map site by identifying maps now available and what would be needed to make them more useful. Mr. Barrett said he would be willing to work on the issue and asked for volunteers. Jesse Gomez, Tom Raymond, and Dr. Covington volunteered with the suggestion of contacting Brian Neuenschwander, who worked on the original maps as an employee of the Graphic Services Department.
Mr. Barrett asked Mr. Sosa if he could forward a 600-pixel wide image of one of the existing building floor maps. Mr. Barrett said he would contact the volunteers shortly to begin work.
There being no other business, Dr. Palmer adjourned the meeting. The next meeting will be Wednesday, May 28, 9:30-10:30 a.m., in the Computing Resources conference room.
-- Minutes prepared by Jim Barrett-- Approved June 25, 2003