One Year:  My Observations of IT at UT - and Future Directions.

I came to Tennessee one year ago.  I have spent the last nine months
working with the various IT groups at UT and meeting with researchers
and educators.   Budgetary restrictions, the collapse of centralized
functions and the loss of faith by faculty in centralized solutions have
greatly hampered my efforts.  IT is critical to successful biological
research and education.  UT must find a path and a budget to provide IT
infrastructure for their researchers including: help desk support for
both desktop and research questions, centralized licensing purchases and
distribution, centralized server and backup systems; "discount" access
to web, database and middleware development and assistance with digital
media production.  Every researcher and educator will need to have these
tools if they are going to compete with their peers at other
institutions.

Jim Phelps - IT Specialist :   ORIT and the Center for Genomics and
Bioinformatics
F325 Walters Life Sciences Building,   University of Tennessee,   
Knoxville 37996
http://web.utk.edu/~jphelps2 (865) 692-9978     jphelps2@utk.edu