Caolan Mc Namara introduced the committee members and gave an introduction and background to the society, including the setting up of the society and outlined why the society was formed.
Ed Harty gave a run through how to log on to the system for new users and also outlined some of the commands available.
David Airlie then mentioned some of the methods for communicating locally with users including IRC and local news. He also mentioned what was considered to be some of the things that users are not permitted to do on the system. These included attempting to crash, break into or generally maliciously disrupt the system. It was also outlined that internet access from the system including external email was not allowed. However it was outlined that for those living in Plassey and Kilmurry villages that internet access was to be provided by ITD after 10 pm.
The situation with the publication of An Focal on the WWW was outlined and a request for people interested in pursuing the post of web administrator was made.
The structure of the current system administration team was outlined, it was pointed out that system administrators were appointed based on ability and not on an electoral system, as this ensures a more stable system. A request was made for people interested in joining the system administration team to approach any of the current sysadmins. Shortages of admins were pointed out as a result of some of last years admins now on cooperative education and that help was required in the areas of IRC, News, FTP and general administration.
Kevin Crosby (kroz@skynet) was uninanimously selected as 1st year officer.
John Buswell (pagan@skynet) was reappointed as PRO.
Ed Harty (hartye@skynet) was reappointed as Secretary.
David Airlie (airlied@skynet) was reappointed as Treasurer.
There were three nominations for the position of president:
1) Stephen Reilly, a manufacturing technology student. He mentioned that he hoped to be employed by a computer firm and that the position would look good on his CV :-)
2) Punnet Sharma, 1st year computer engineering. He suggested that the society should undergo lots of change, he would promote free internet access, receive extra funding for the society and would be prepared to use his own computer as a computer society server. It was outlined by the committee that the idea of free internet access for undergraduates was not economically feasible for ITD or the HEAnet. Members were also informed of the current situation of DCU computer society (Redbrick) having lost their internet access as a result of excess network usage by members.
3) Caolan Mc Namara, 4th computer engineering was renominated but hesitantly stated that he had too much work for the position, he said that however if he was nominated that he wouldnt mind doing the job as he is currently one of the senior members of the system administration team. He also outlined his views on internet access for users and highlighted that in fact that users could put their web pages on the net, and effectively this was excellent value for money when compared to some of what the ISP's were charging.
Ed Harty counted votes for each of the three candidates:
Stephen Reilly 10 votes
Punnet Sharme 19 votes
Caolan Mc Namara 18 votes.
Punnet Sharma was appointed president.
Members were asked if they had anything further to add to the meeting.
The committee stated that accounts would be created for users in the VAX lab after the meeting.
The meeting was concluded.
It has also transpired this weekend that the Redbrick server is also back
on line at least for the moment with email and local network access
only.