Forum addresses students’ concerns

By Matt Lindner
Staff Writer

A group of three administrators stood in front of a crowd of about 100 students with only a PowerPoint presentation and their minds to defend against the multitude of questions the students had concerning the problems with RESNET.

The students who gathered Wednesday night to discuss their concerns had a wide range of computer knowledge — some knew the intricacies of RESNET and others were there only to gain information about it for class. University administrators have worked to solve the problems for some time.

"The people that we have brought in to deal with the RESNET problems are very experienced and have the students’ best interests in mind when it comes to the service," said John Sautter, vice president of Housing and Food Services.

One issue brought up during the forum was the problem of rate limiting, which is put into place when students use too much bandwidth for downloads. Josh Snyder, a junior in the School of Liberal Arts, said rate limiting is causing major problems during the time he spends using the Internet.

"When the rate limits are put into place, it creates Internet confusion," said Snyder. "This makes it harder for users to download academic information. I tried downloading software onto my computer over Thanksgiving break, but because of the rate limiting, the server was reset and the download was terminated."

Jerry Sheehan, assistant vice president of information technology, said 375 complaints have been logged via E-mail since the beginning of the year and that most of the complaints have a common theme.

"Most of the complaints that we receive deal with certain applications timing out during peak times," said Sheehan. "We are working towards a solution that is both beneficial to the University and the student body. Everything we do concerning RESNET will have student input because we are looking out for their best interests first."

Beth Abbott, a freshman in Undergraduate Studies who attended the forum with classmates, didn't understand some of the technical talk and felt it could have been better explained.

"Most of the things that were said were way over my head," said Abbott. "All of the talk during the forum was about how every student needs more bandwidth in order to efficiently use the Internet. I don’t think that half of the students even know what bandwidth really is."

Generally, both students and staff were satisfied with the results.

"I was happy with the results of their research," said Travis Sugarbaker, a freshman in the School of Science. "It seems as though they are definitely working towards a solution that is both beneficial to the students and economically feasible."

Sheehan also felt the dialogue was positive. "We enjoyed discussing the RESNET problems with the students because it gives us a better variety of feedback," said Sheehan. "We feel as though some groundwork was laid tonight to help improve the quality of Internet service provided by RESNET."

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Forum addresses students’ concerns

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