The challenge is to provide a secure, highly available, appropriately resourced technical infrastructure that underpins the learning and teaching, research, and administrative activities of the University. Working with the Director of IT Infrastructure services and representatives from the business units of flexible learning and teaching ( FLT) and Integrated Administrative Services ( IAS ). I have started the process of positioning hardware and environments between the two data centres to provide sufficient resources to perform Disaster Recovery ( DR ) in the event of the loss of a production service at one of the two centres. The outcomes for the business are significant in that it would be possible to restart a production service on an alternate server with minimal downtime albeit in some instances marginally degraded  to the other site.

As team leader in Shared Systems I have provided the drive, coaching, and support to facilitate the establishment of Tape silos at both data centres. The outcomes for the University is that the requirement to provide off-site backup is being met, and due to the "crossover design" disaster recovery ( DR ) will be faster as the data is positioned alongside the hardware it is planned to use in the restore.

The challenge is to improve the way the University manages its Mission critical data. In meetings with staff spanning the Networks, Microcomputer, and Shared Systems teams I have been progressing the concept of long distance mirroring of critical data, and the adoption of a datacentric view. The SAN project has the potential to deliver for the University a very scalable, storage solution that drives down the Total Cost of Ownership ( TCO ) of storage by providing for a more centralized management and dynamically allocable storage units to servers on a needs basis.

In working with the Business owners and the ITS directors in the selection, configuration, procurement, and, commissioning of two Sun E10K servers it was possible to provide a very flexible, highly available, resilient platform for delivery of services. The outcomes for Monash is that it is very well provisioned and positioned to deliver high quality services on a Global scale to its customer base, by leveraging off the flexibility of E10K architecture, providing a mechanism to dynamically re-configure hardware as the service requirements change. Hot swap of CPU’s, memory, and I/O adapters is also supported.

The challenge was to position myself to support the move away from the VMS based Legacy systems to the new Unix environment chosen for the e-Business Applications. After the identification of the platform I began the task of the rapid uptake of skills in Solaris System Administration, E10K administration and architecture. As part of the installation I produced detailed documentation of the processes involved on the Shared Systems WWW pages to assist other staff in the transition to E10K support. The results for the University were that we were able to manage the smooth transition from VMS based systems to the Solaris systems, with the re-skilling of existing staff, support costs for the new environment were contained.

The challenge is to enhance the Security of the environment to prevent unlawful access to University data, and to prevent the University’s servers being used to launch attacks against other sites. I drafted a set of guidelines for Shared Systems Staff to follow in the event of an attack, these have been placed before the Security Working Group who are in the process of moving the drafted guidelines into one of the ‘new’ security frameworks The benefits to the University from this work is that it is well positioned to carry out forensics following an attack, advise the various CERT organizations while maintaining a chain of custody on the data should the Federal Police become involved. A spin off from this draft is that Shared Systems now has a standard set of security ‘lock-down’ procedures that we apply to any system following a build.

The challenge is to provide a mechanism that will allow for the fast, repeatable recovery of a server in the event that it is compromised of has serious hardware failure. Recently I employed an engineer as a casual who had already spent several months setting up a similar system using jumpstart for a French Telco. With the assistance of System Administration support from Shared Systems Staff I drafted a requirements brief and developed a project plan. In about 10 weeks we had a facility that would allow Unix System Administration staff a customised ‘locked-down’ installation tool that catered for Solaris Versions 2.6, V7 and V8. This tool is now in production, and documented on the Shared Systems WWW pages.

The challenge was to provide quality power and environmentals to the Computer rooms to ensure continuity of services. I managed this major infrastructure project with Consultants and Suppliers. Selected a 900kVA motor generator set to ensure continuity of supply to Building 28, and protect the University from Power outages it was experiencing with the local Utility ( United Energy ) at the time. Coupled with Uninterruptable Power Supply’s ( UPS’s ) downstream the Central Computing resources where now fully protected from unwanted power outages. Part two of this project saw the introduction of a Digital Synchroniser added, to provide seamless power transfers, and load shedding. The daily operation of this facility has been passed off to Production Facilities. As an indicator of the success of this project we have had servers with uptimes of over 480 days.

The challenge is to reduce the diversity of host ( Server ) Platforms, through the process of consolidation of services onto a common hardware platform. With the interoperability requirements of Callista and SAP a decision was made to select Sun Microsystems as the vendor of choice, given that Callista was being developed in a Solaris environment and was not ported to the Compaq Tru64 Unix environment. My involvement has been to size environments, and provision resources to ensure that where appropriate, core services that are currently operating outside the platform of choice are migrated into the preferred server platform. The most recent of these has been the provision of IT Services to Southern Africa, and, the migration of Silas. There may be some instances where it does not make Business sense to migrate a service onto a large host, for example the WWW proxy service. The process of consolidation of the University Core Business Services will drive down the total cost of ownership ( TCO ) by leveraging off economies of scale.

The challenge is to reduce the diversity of Operating Systems within ITS. With the migration of core services to a preferred vendor, we begin the process of consolidation of Operating Systems. The winding down of the Legacy application systems will see the demise of VMS, and the focus of System Administrators will be on Unix variants.  The Business case from IAS to support ESS under SAP will require some upskilling of Shared Systems Staff in the Windows NT Server Operating System. My actions to date have been to purchase some Technical reference materials for the Team and investigate suitable training programs to get a few of the Shared Systems Staff up to speed before the IAS requirement reaches us. The results for monash would be a seamless transition from Unix only based Application Servers in SAP to a hybrid Unix and NT based environment.

The challenge is to investigate the application of emerging technologies to assist Monash achieve a strategic / competitive advantage through the rapid uptake of such technologies. It was a visit I made to Sun in Gordon, NSW several years ago with a colleague, and a subsequent report I wrote for the Director, that paved the way for Monash to consider the E10K as a serious contender for its new e-Business Applications. Through the attendance at technical conferences  ( eg. SuperG ) keeping a watch using the internet and discussion groups I have kept abreast of trends in product and been in a position to make recommendations to Senior Management about the viability of moving into new technologies.

The challenge is to provide a mechanism to drive down the TCO of maintenance support. The use of Monash Staff on the ground to provide the first level support for systems, defines the role of the vendor as parts supplier and phone support service for the University. In the past I was able to secure savings of up to 70% below standard monthly charges for support. In fact costing my time and another engineer’s time at $100K each I was able to demonstrate savings of over $750K p.a. Just in the area of hardware support. It is appropriate that a cost benefit analysis be performed on the existing service contracts with a view to rationalizing the expenditure.

The challenge is to provide a way that ITS can deliver services to faculties where agreements are in place that define the requirement to have trained staff at Monash to perform the initial diagnosis of a failing service. While Monash as a whole enjoys a considerable saving by having such contracts in place ITS is required to provide the training of its own staff to service the contract. My approach, or recommendation to management would be to increase the premiums from the faculties to cover the ITS training requirements, and adopt a fee for service model for call outs and phone support. This option it likely to be cheaper and more timely than paying the vendor to attend site and perform the fault resolution.

The challenge is to provide for the life cycle replacement of technical infrastructure, using project methodology. At all levels across the University the whole of life planning of a service is seldom performed. Within the Business units a framework that defines the expected life of a service, the daily cost of delivery, its support costs over that period and eventual decommissioning costs needs to be set in place. Then and only then will there be an appreciation of the true costs associated with that service. If upgrades are to be part of the cycle they too need to be costed. It was only by creative use of resources, that I was able to build two new systems to operate in parallel with the CALDEV and CALQAT landscapes. A requirement to support the current Callista upgrades, substantially reducing the cost to the University. This information needs to be included in the Budget cycle for the Division to provision accurately for the total costs of an ongoing service delivery, especially as ITS moves towards Activity Based Costing ( ABC ).

Professional experience
 

Monash University Computer Centre / ITS Clayton, Victoria. (1981 - 2001)

Acting Manager for Shared Systems (up to 15 staff). (2000 ~ 2001)

Team Leader for the Large System Group for Shared Systems (2000 ~ 2001)

Active Member of the ITS Security Working Group (2000 ~ 2001)

Acting Head of the Shared Systems Team. (Up to 4 weeks at a time ). (1992 ~ 1996)

Second Level Support for ITS Site Engineering. (1997 ~ 2001)

Computer Centre Site Engineer. (Focal point, spans team boundaries). (1994 ~ 1996)

Computer Centre Safety Officer. (1989 ~ 2000)

MANAGEMENT: -

thomsett Essential Techniques in Project Management Jun. 2000

thomsett 3^rd Wave Project Management Executive Overview 2000

High energy teams Nov. 1994

TQM Process Improvement Jan. 1994

Staff Selection (Monash accreditation) Jul. 1994

Time Management Aug. 1990

Performance Enhancement Oct. 1994

HARDWARE: -

Vendor Specific

DEC 7xxx Alpha Installation, Clustering and Commissioning Jan 1994

Vax 6xxx Series Level 1 Maintenance. (Digital @ Rhodes NSW) Apr. 1991

SECURITY: -

SANS SECURITY CONFERENCE San Francisco Dec 1999

Information Security / Incident Handling

Intrusion Detection / Firewalls

Windows 2000 Security / Email Liability

Info Warfare / Hacker tools

UNIX/Linux Security / Nmap

Auditing / and more…

SOFTWARE: -

Vendor Specific

Sun E10,000 System Administration 1999

Sun High Availability Clustering Systems 1999

Sun SUPER-G Conference E10K and HPC 1999

Windows NT 4 Workstation (Self Taught) 1998

Sun Solaris System Administration 11 1998

Sys Solaris System Administration 1 1998

Professional memberships
 

Elected a Graduate of the Institute of Engineers, Australia

Eligible for Corporate Membership of the Institute of Engineers, Australia.

Eligible for Professional membership of the Australian Computer Society.

MANAGEMENT: -

Strategic: -

Understanding of the emerging vision contained in "Leading the Way" Monash 2020.

Knowledge of the LTOP, Research Management & Global Development Framework.

Significant Input to the University Wide IT Strategic Plan 2001 – 2003

Involvement in the creation of the IT department Operational and Works plans

Am well informed of the development of the Human Resources Plan, the development of

a Services Catalogue, and the generation of Service Level Agreements.

Staff Development and Performance Plans aligned to the Monash Strategic directions

I have a broad understanding of Strategic Sourcing models, inc. Business Value, Risk

management and Strategic Competencies, in the delivery of infrastructure services.

Involved in a Cost Benefit Analysis of the IT support Contracts with our major Vendors.

Exploring options that drive down the Total Cost of Ownership TCO of delivered services

Looking into the True cost of service delivery as detailed in the Strategic Cost Management

Project Charter. ( ABC ), recognize the potential of the Balanced Scorecard methodology.

Able to anticipate problems and by early intervention prevent disasters.

Capable of timely and effective decision making

Strong interpersonal communication skills.

Able to synthesize two or more points of view.

Be proactive in conflict resolution, demonstrate appropriate humility.

Trained Convenor for University Staff Selection Panels.

A proven, demonstrable track record of being a, capable & decisive Team Leader.

Able to assign priorities to ensure the right tasks are done at the right time.

Have provided motivation, leadership, supervision & counseling within the team

Able to utilise blends of skills within the team.

Able to meet team time frames and objectives.

Have developed relevant peer contacts in the supported areas.

Have productive relationships with the University's major Computer systems Vendors.

Possession of the special skills and knowledge required to: -

Provisioning Hardware to address Business Continuity Planning ( BCP ) or at least Disaster Recovery ( DR ) of mission critical University Compute Services.

Be capable of supporting all the multi-user systems, which support the University's teaching, research, library and administrative programs to meet or exceed the Customers standards & requirements. (Combination of Sun Microsystems Enterprise class & Compaq / Digital Vax

and Alpha, and SGI Range of equipment).

Provide the University with high quality, cost effective and timely on-site computer maintenance.

Train staff in the use of specialised equipment to trouble-shoot computer systems down to component or Field Replaceable Unit (FRU) level.

Assign priorities to hardware problems and distribute work to others in the team, to keep all the University's Mission Critical systems at their highest level of availability and uptime.

Pro-actively review equipment status, looking for more cost effective and reliable solutions to Customers computing requirements.

Evaluate new equipment, correctly size, accurately predict performance and make technical recommendations for the Continuous upgrading of the University's computer systems.

Generate requisitions for new hardware purchases in excess of $1,000,000 each year.

Possession of the special skills and knowledge required to: -

Installation of Operating Systems on supported platforms, including the security lockdown of these platforms. Be able to identify software problems and able to "tune systems for optimal response".

Advise and assist others in security related matters.

Design, customise and install computer systems using software monitoring tools,

Use diagnostic tuning tools to re-deploy peripherals, to ensure load balancing on production systems.

Offer Unix - Solaris, VMS Systems support as required.

Benchmark new computer architectures against existing platforms.

Referees

REFERENCES UPON REQUEST
 
 

1/ David Wilson. Ex: - Head of Shared Systems ITS Monash University Clayton
 

Now: - Optimation Software Engineering    Phone (03) 9828 9130. Fax (03) 9828 9191.
 

Phone (03) 9905 4768. Fax (03) 9905 4746

3/ Ken Lee. Integrated Administrative Services (IAS), Monash University Clayton
 

Phone (03) 9905 6915 Fax (03) 9905 3024

4/ Dr Asad Khan. School of Network Computing, Monash University, Peninsula Campus.
 

Phone (03) 9904 4689 Fax (03) 9904 4124
 

Phone 0419585348 Fax (03) 9387 1652