Computing Infrastructure
The computing and network infrastructure of the School is maintained by the Information Systems Group. Below is a general listing of the network and computing infrastructure maintained by ISG.
Computer labs
Computer labs are essential in supporting teaching and providing hands-on experience to the students with software used in the industry. ISG maintains more than one hundred computers spread among 5 computer labs available to students: Mason 297 contains 26 Pentium 4 class machines, Mason 298 contains 14 Pentium 4 class machines, SEB 102 houses 40 Pentium 4 class machines, SEB 121 houses Pentium 4 class machines, and ES&T houses 8 Pentium 4 class machines. In most cases, each of these computers is equipped with LCD screens. Software such as Autocad, Solid Edge, Matlab, Mathcad, SPSS, Gauss, Biowin are installed in all the labs and available to students and faculty. Several heavy duty laser printers (black and white or color) as well as plotters are also available. The Mason and SEB labs are equipped with swipe card readers to provide after hour access to students.
Desktops and Workstations
ISG currently maintains close to 1,000 computers ranging from regular desktops to state of the art multi-cpus workstation to conduct intensive simulations. ISG also maintains High Performance Computing (HPC) facilities for several research groups.
Network infrastructure
The School of CEE network is based on a Gigabit backbone in order to support the multiple research activities, collaboration projects and distance learning initiative. Every computer is provided with a 100MB full duplex connection.
Security
The security model of the school of CEE includes a prevention and detection components. Regular audits are being conducted. A centrally managed automated patch mechanism system is being scheduler for deployment first quarter of 2005. Finally, some collaboration are currently underway to provide the School of CEE with state of the art Intrusion Detection Systems (anomaly based). Several projects are currently being conducted in order to provide a high level of protection and reliability without impairing innovation. A layered security model is at the center of these initiatives. Border firewalls are being deployed to protect the School of CEE from external attacks. Managed personal firewalls (ISS Real Secure Desktop Protector) are scheduled to be deployed early 2005 in order to provide a better level of security for roaming users.
Services
ISG provides a wide range of information technology services to faculty, staff, students, and researchers. These services are: Mail server (with several gigabyte of e-mail space for each users) with e-mail remote access, web services, email lists management, managed and backup disk space, and assistance in specifying, ordering and installing computers from a regular desktop to an HPC cluster.