Staffordshire U N I V E R S I T Y
Overview
IT Services manages the computer network and facilitates computers by students and
staff in the university.
Major advice centres:
The Octagon Stafford
Brindley IT Centre Leek Road, Stoke Cadman Building
College Road, Stoke Advisory Desks
When they are available, staff give computing advice and assistance from: Law School
Blackheath Lane
Leek Road I3eaconside
Support services
IT Services supports a wide range of computing facilities across the university,
including:
· Over 3000 distributed desktop computers: Windows PCs and Apple Macintosh. · A campus
network connecting ail computers and giving access to the Intemet, SuperJANET and World
Wide Web.
· Digital Equipment Company colour graphics workstations for computer-aidecl <! ;ign
and engineering.
· A network of Digital Alpha, NT and VAX multi-acce . ,md client/server .... . . . ·
Laser, inkjet and dot matrix printers.
· Electronic mail.
· Extensive libraries of software covering many subject areas.
· Friendly advice and assistance to users near their workplace; programming; operations;
equipment purchase, installation, maintenance and repair; communications and networkins~
· Systems analysis and design.
· Training on use of IT equipment, media and software.
Sales
IT Services Help Desks sell a range of computer-related items to students. See p12
for details.
Printing
Black and white printing is available in all labs with high quality colour printing
available forom, selected Help Desks. See p12 for details.
Software
For a full list of software available, obtain the following documents: L026
Software at Stafford /L027 Software at Stoke
A wide range of user documentation is availahle see p34 -37: USER 136 Printcol list. Help
Desks
IT Services staff provide advice and assistance on most aspects of computing. If you have
a problem using any of the personal computers, or printers, contact your local Help Desk
or Advisory Desk. 3
Stafford campus General information Helping you compute.
The Stafford campus
IT Services is based within the Octagon. The main focus of IT activity for students
is the Concourse, a large open access area on the lower ground lloor. In addition to the
Octagon, computing labs may he found in the Beacon Building. at Blackheath Lane and in the
Netson Library.
The Octagon
This is the major IT centre for the uníversity and the range of facílitíes
províded by I't Services within the Octagon bullding consists of the following rooms on
the concourse: KCi/3/4/5/6/7/9/10/11/13/14/15/16/18 providing in totat:
· 255 PCs Windows NT · 40 PCs Windows 3.11
· 40 Apple Macintosh comh~.,~<. , Level 1 - K113
· 19 Alpha Workstations · Student Learníng Areas
· Networked colour and black and white laser printers, dot matrix printers · 40 graphics
workstations for computer aided design and engineering, comprising DEC Alphastation 200
and DECstation 5000 - 120 models
· Connection from the desktop computers to a network of powerful DEC Alpha servers
Student Learning Areas
A new facilíty as part of the `Buílding a Learníng Community' initíatíve.
Located in KCO9 on the Octagon Concourse, this area is for collaborative :. ~ oi group
learning. A similar open access area is located in C150, Beacon Building.
The Octagon Student Learning Area m:u. I :.a Ixx~ked lw ~ontacting the Help Desk.
Octagoya -Stnfford
Octagon concourse-Stafford
Problems, problems
If you have a computing problem, contact your local Help Desk. Occasionally you may
be referred to one of the following members of staff:
Director of Information Technology: d.e.ord@staffs.ac.uk
Area of expertise
Systems Manager, all sites Network p.h.butler@staffs.ac.uk
Webmaster, all sites
Internet webmaster@staffs.ac.uk
Postmaster, all sites
Email postmaster@staffs.ac.uk
Academic Support Manager, all sites General r.c.evans@staffs.ac.uk
Computer Operations Manager, Stafford General p.t.merricks@staffs.ac.uk
Computer Operations Manager, Stoke General m.a.fletcher@staffs.ac.uk
TT Services departmental offices
Stafford Octagon K132 (01785 35) 3413
Stoke Brindley IT Centre B114d (01782 29) 4120
Help Desk sales
Items for sale from iT Services Help Desks
Please note: All items are sold at cost, no profit is made. Some items may not be
available from all Help Desks. Prices correct at time of printing, but may be revised.
'Disks (each)
Double density ^0.30 High density ^0.50 High density x 2 ^0.80
Laser printing and photocopying per single A4 page
IT Services may introduce a central printing facility in the future
for Windows NT PCs tktagon Help ~psi Laser prints (and photocopies) are paid for by using
a charge card :a~ the printer/rnpier
Laser prints ^0.07 Photocopies ^0.05 Charge cards from Help Desks ^1.00 (refundable on
return) Charge the card yourself with cash to a~ . value using the `Value Loader' m:~
located near the Help Desks or labs.
Vatue Loader machines
Stoke - Brindley, Cadman, Law 1 Value Loader near each Help Desk ~ Stafford - Blackheath
Lane 1 Value Loader near the Help Desk Stafford - Octagon Ready charged cards only
^1.00/ ^Z.00/ ^5·00 discounted to ^4t.5(1 ^10.00 discounted to ^8.00
Example of black and white pri n c i ~ c g costs Laserprinttng Pbotocopying .f 1 = 15
copies .^5 = 72 copies .^1 = 21 copies .f5 = 100 copies ~2 = 29 copies ^ 10 = 143 copie.s
^2 = 4o copies .^ 10 = 200 copies Colour Printing and location
Inkjet Brindley ^0.30 paper prints Thermal wax Brindley ^0.75 paper prints
Colour laser Octagon (high quality) ^0.70 paper prints/^1.50 ~. . i.~v. . (See L025 Colour
printing service, Stafford, or ask at the Help Desk). Scanning
Scanning facilities are available near to Help Desks and within some comlo ~ ~ ~ r labs.
Acetates for use in photocopier ^0.10
Note: You must use only the acetates sold by IT Seruices which m ~ :pecifically for n .,
in the pb other acetates may damage the machine and pu u~ill he liable tc~, .: rt,,jor the
jull c ~: «jservicG photocopier if this occurs.
Past exam papers (over the counter at the Octagon) School of Computing examination papers
^0.50 - ^1.00
" Note: All prices are corcect time of printing but may be subject to change 12
Overview of the network
Staffordshire University has in place an ATM network operating between the three
campus sites at Stoke-on-Trent, Stafford and Lichfield. These links are provided over a
managed SDH service and operate at 622 Mbps.
The network has five Cisco Lightstream 1010 switches at the core, each connected to
a Cisco 7206 router via a 155 Mbps ATM interface. The routers connect to a Cisco Catalyst
5000 switch via a 100 Mbps Fast Ethernet interface. The Cisco Catalyst 5000 switches are
used to connect all Ethernet segments and server computers into the network via 100/10
Ethernet interfaces.
Multi-mode fibre-optic cable is installed between all main buildings within a campus.
These links generally operate at 100 Mbps using a combination of Cisco Catalyst 5000, 3200
and 1900 switches. Horizontal distsibution wiring from the hubs to the workplace has been
installed using Category 5 unshielded twisted pair (UTP) cable, providing switched 100/10
Mhps Ethemet connections, for desktop computers.
The network used mainly to support workgroups of desktop computers of which over 3,000 are
now connected. The principal student and staff client platform is Windows PC. There are
smaller numhers of Apple Macintosh and SUN/DEC workstations. DEC Alpha computers mnning NT
or DEC Unix are typically used as servers for file, print and other services. The current
applications operating over the network are mainly text based, but there is an increasing
requirement for graphics, audio and video. The applications include administrative systems
based on Oracle database, electronic mail, file and print services to server computers,
World Wide Web and other Internet services, and terminal access to multi-user systems.
The predominant protocol is TCP/IP, although other protocols are used including DECnet,
LAT, IPX, NetBios and Appletalk.
The University has recently installed a number of ATM-6ased video conferencing systems of
near-broadcast-quality using K-Net Cellstack codecs. PC-based video conferencing products
such as PictureTel Livelan are also being evaluated.
A link to SuperJANET is in place for access to other higher education irutitutions and the
worldwide Internet, ternùnating at the Stoke campus. This is provided via a 155 Mbps ATM
connection into Network North West, a Metropolitan Area Network which connects all North
West higher education instirinions.
Dial-up access for staff is provided using a Tricom rack of V34 (28.8 Kbps) modems and a
Xylogics Annex communications server.
Smaller sites of the University at Cannock (Staffordshire) and Shrewsbury (Shropshire) are
currently linked via BT 64 Kbps Kilostream circuits, for which a substantial upgrade in
capacity will be needed in the near future. An Ethernet link to a research base of the
School of Health in the Stafford District General Hospital, 1 Km distant from the StafFord
campus,
is in operdtion using line-of sight laser equipment.
A rapidly growing number of outreach centres, regional colleges and schools are also being
linked as JANET Affiliated Connections using Kilostream or ISDN2 circuits. Connection of
these remote sites to the network is currently made via Cisco 2500 routers.