The first WiscNet Third Thursdays Session of the 2009-10 school year will be held September 17, 2009 from 2:00 – 3:30. We will explore the topic of Community area networks (CANs). With the federal broadband stimulus program underway there are epic opportunities to fund the development of community area networks. This past summer WiscNet sparked conversations in communities throughout Wisconsin. With very short timelines it was difficult for people to the process exactly what are a community area networks and why they are important.
Community Area Network: The interconnection of community anchor institutions (schools, libraries, colleges, universities, municipalities, and hospitals) within a region with dark fiber.
This session is geared toward beginner to intermediate audiences with regard to networking. We will review basics of what community area networks are, why they are important, and critical steps towards making them happen in your communities. We will share resources collected from successful community area network efforts including information on governance structures, organizational strategies, and information you can bring back to your community.
WiscNet Third Thursday sessions are open to anybody. Registration is quick and free. Visit https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/986483098 and provide us with your details. We’ll send information about how to attend online.
MasStore began a few years back as a simple conversation around WiscNet. “How do we support our members’ needs in backing up critical data?” A bunch of ideas were tossed around within the CDBR (Critical Data Backup and Recovery) Workgroup. As the conversation progressed we saw an opportunity with putting a NetApp appliance on the network.
Recently, WiscNet stuck 70TB of Internet accessible disk in the UW-Milwaukee data center and called it MasStore. While big disk is interesting, big disk on big pipes is more interesting. Furthermore, with WiscNet’s “Grow Smart” initiative, the cost per megabit isn’t a factor. We invited a few our members to make things interesting with how they thought of bandwidth.
The graph below is familiar to WiscNet members who watch bandwidth. The green line is incoming traffic (download), the blue line is outgoing traffic (upload). Most of WiscNet’s members see intervals along the left side of 10Mb/s with the green lines (downlaod) plateauing.
UW-Green Bay was the first to make things interesting with MasStore. What you see above is a file transfer from UW-Green Bay to UW-Milwaukee scheduled mid-day. The big blue spiked line is outgoing FTP files (upload speed) peaking at 382.89Mb/s between UW-Green Bay and the NetApp disk in Milwaukee. So far, tests of CIFS file transfers are in the range of 150Mb/s. Translation: At these rates we could push a 250GB across the backbone in less than 4 hours.
Interesting.
For more information about MasStore, contact Craig Stephenson at craig.stephenson@wiscnet.net.
If you’re following the broadband stimulus story, there were two new happenings this week that you’ll want to be aware of.
- First, NTIA/RUS published a database of proposals received in the first round of broadband stimulus grants. The database can be searched by organization, project type, state, or program. Wisconsin submitted a total of 31 applications for $384,418,040 - including proposals in all three categories (Infrastructure – last and middle mile, Public Computer Centers and Sustainable Broadband Adoption). Next week the governor’s office will get this list and then make its recommendations back to RUS/NTIA within 20 days.
- Second, Assistant Secretary Strickling of the NTIA spoke before a Congressional subcommittee and explained that it is possible the second BTOP round could be pushed back in time to accomodate possible changes in the program — and that there might be only one more round, not two. More details are available on the Committee on Energy and Commerce website and a press report covering the testimony.
The WiscNet backbone saw an increase in traffic of approximately 800 Mb/s during President Obama’s address to school children on Tuesday. The backbone stood strong with no complications and the schools that were best suited to broadcast the event over the Internet were schools that took advantage of Grow Smart, upgrading their speeds to anywhere between 10 Mb/s and 100 Mb/s.
Every year the UW-Madison conducts a survey of current students to determine usage and satisfaction with technology services and products. While the results are exclusive to UW-Madison students, the conclusions may prove interesting to educators state-wide.
For example, reviewing the results to the “Please indicate which of the following technologies you use for SCHOOL WORK:” survey question may help educators evaluate their own use of certain technologies in their classrooms.
And what are students at UW-Madison using?
|
Response Percent
|
| Wikis |
45%
|
| Gmail |
42%
|
| Google docs (Writing, spreadsheets, etc, but not Gmail) |
39%
|
| YouTube |
31%
|
| Computer kiosks |
27%
|
| Podcasts |
24%
|
| Social networks |
17%
|
| Clickers |
15%
|
| Blogs |
14%
|
| Digital video |
12%
|
| Skype |
7%
|
| Handheld Web device |
5%
|
| Flickr |
3%
|
| Social bookmarking and/or Social news |
3%
|
| e-Portfolio |
2%
|
| Virtual worlds |
1%
|
| Other |
4%
|
For the complete list of results for both the student and faculty surveys, you can visit the Division of Information Technology’s research page.
