(11/15/07) On campus, Illinois has over 150 teraflops of computational capacity, 10 gigagbits-per-second redundant connections to major research networks and over 2 petabytes of storage, serving over 60,000 registered hosts on the campus network and collaborators around the globe.
The campus data network is connected to dual 1 Gbps connections to the commercial Internet and to other research networks via a University-owned fiber ring with multiple 10 Gbps channels (lambdas). Consequently, members of the campus community can work with collaborators on the other side of the world as if they were next door. Faculty, staff, and students are eligible for email, spam control, web publishing, and file storage accessible securely from a web browser -- truly any time, any place storage. Over 175 software packages are available free or deeply discountetd thanks to site licenses and a convenient online distribution channel to the campus community. Illinois is home not only to the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, one of the largest supercomputing centers in the world, but also to one of the regional Access Grid sites. The Access Grid is a multicast system that allows people around the world to come together in a shared real-time virtual environment, including audio, video, support materials, and even experimental instruments. The 225,000 square foot Siebel Center for Computer Science, one of the most technologically advanced buildings on any campus, is an interactive computing habitat where students and faculty explore issues in pervasive computing, building intelligence, security and privacy, art, music - in short, evolving culture and lifestyles. Innovative wireless technology extends to the far reaches of campus, forming an outdoor laboratory for studying animal, crop, and environmental issues. The wireless facilities provide remote monitoring and collection of experimental data, live images via web cameras, and laptop connectivity for researchers in the field.
The University Library houses one of the largest public university collections, and now complements that collection with electronic items (e.g., approximately 300,000 electronic books and over 70,000 electronic journals) and an aggressive program to digitize its collection holdings. More than 53,000,000 annual visitors to the on-line catalog. Over 3,000 instructors and 33,000 students each semester use the campus learning management system. Illinois is home to the country's largest student chapter of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), one of many student-oriented groups organized to help students explore special interests and hone skills outside the classroom. Support for users of technology at Illinois takes many forms, including: Help Desk assistance in person, email, phone, online chat, or virtual presence in the Library and labs where students gather; on-site (office or home) hands-on assistance; special laptop support services for students taking innovative "Writing with Video" classes; system administration services for everything from desktop computers to 1,500-processor research clusters.
Wireless data: http://www.cites.uiuc.edu/wireless/locations.html#locations
Over 150 Buildings and 85% of all classrooms have wireless access
167 - Computer labs, classrooms, etc. that are accessible by students
21 - Average number of computers/computer lab
17,466 - Open, wired network connections available to students
16% - Percent of classrooms that allow wire connectivity
75% - Percent of publicly accessible computers that are PC
15% - Percent of publicly accessible computers that are Apple
10% - Percent of publicly accessible computers that are Unix
IT Talking Points:
- Illinois has a long history of innovation in computing, including the world’s first parallel supercomputer, first web browser, and fastest transistor. The innovation continues today with pioneering work in data mining, secure environments, machine learning, concurrent programming, and tools and protocols for Internet2. Network Worlds’ “10 Cutting Edge Network Research Projects” highlights technology developed at Illinois for pooling neighborhood Wi-Fi Internet access to deliver better performance, exploiting otherwise idle bandwidth.
- Illinois graduates are designers of major software and hardware systems, founders of leading high-tech companies, and authors of some of the most popular games. Among the notables: Ray Ozzie (VisiCalc, Lotus Notes, Groove Networks, and now chief software architect at Microsoft), Thomas Siebel (Siebel Systems), Steve Dorner (Eudora), Don Bitzer (plasma screen display), Steve Chen (designer of the CRAY XMP supercomputer), Jerry Sanders (founder of AMD), Ed Boon (Midway Games, Mortal Combat), Mike Kulas (Volition, Red Faction), Bruce Artwick (SubLOGIC, Flight Simulator), Marc Andreesen (Mosaic and Netscape), and Max Levchin (PayPal).
- Illinois is home not only to the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA), one of the largest academic supercomputing centers in the world, but also to one of the regional Access Grid® sites (http://www.accessgrid.org ). The Access Grid® is a multicast system that allows people around the world to come together in a shared real-time virtual environment, including audio, video, support materials, and even experimental instruments.
- The 225,000 square foot Siebel Center for Computer Science, one of the most technologically advanced buildings on any campus, is an interactive computing habitat. Advanced wireless and wired communication networks, sensors, actuators, video capture and display equipment, video walls, and storage and computing capabilities within the building allow students and faculty to explore issues in pervasive computing, building intelligence, security and privacy, art – in short, evolving culture and lifestyles of the 21st century.
- At the Center for Computing in Humanities, Arts, and Social Science (CHASS) innovation is fostered by engaging humanists, artists, and social scientists in sustained collaboration with colleagues in computer science, engineering, and high performance computing and communications, in order to identify, create, and adapt computational tools that will accelerate research and education in the humanities, arts, and social sciences.
- Innovative wireless technology extends to the far reaches of campus, including our farms where even the cows have connectivity and the wheat fields have Wi-Fi. Illini BeefNet, DairyNet, HorseNet, PorkNet, PoultryNet, and SheepNet offer online resources provided by our researchers in Animal Sciences. Pioneering Wi-Fi portability technology has enabled unique connections to the campus network at distances exceeding 4 miles using high gain directional antennas (with solar panels and even a backup generator for extended cloudy periods). This technology enables remote monitoring and collection of experimental data including metrological studies, live images via web camera, and laptop connectivity for researchers in the field.
- HAL, the intelligent, smooth-talking computer in the 1968 novel and film "2001: A Space Odyssey" was said to originate in Urbana in 1997.
- The Illinois student chapter of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) is the largest in the country, and it is only one of many computer-oriented groups organized to help students explore special interests and hone skills outside the classroom. Illinois students consistently take top honors at national and international competitions.
- Engineering Open House, one of the largest student-run science fairs in the country, introduces a world of possibilities to thousands of elementary and high school students each year through games, tracking systems, simulations, robots, multimedia shows, and exhibits created by University of Illinois students.
- Students at University of Illinois are able to take a variety of credit courses online, from multiple disciplines, including Guided Individual Study courses. The University of Illinois Internet Computer Science (I2CS) program offers an online computer science master’s degree that is identical to that delivered on campus—exams, homework and all—but can be completed without coming to campus. Other institutions, most notably Samsung in Korea, collaborate to deliver the master’s curriculum across the globe.
- Illinois instructors are experimenting with a new tool called the IClicker, a device the size of a television remote control that provides instant interaction between students and their instructors, even in large lecture halls.IClicker was developed in the Physics department, and uses technology to provide all-important immediate feedback to students and instructors.
- Accessibility and resource sharing are the hallmarks of the University Library system. Use of the University of Illinois Library’s extensive electronic materials (online catalog, bibliographic databases, Library web sites, and web services) includes more than one million items circulated annually and many more accessed on site.
- Just as the University of Illinois led the country in physical accessibility decades ago, we are now leaders in IT accessibility, with the goal of equal access to IT resources for all students, faculty, and staff. Not only have we created best practices for developing truly accessible web sites, but we also have software that webmasters can use to evaluate the functional accessibility of their sites. Our wizard for Microsoft Office converts Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents to an accessible format (http://www.cita.uiuc.edu/software/office/ ).
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