Members Present:  Professors Allen, Chen, Darden, Greim (for Hoyle), Moody, Murphy,  Reichardt, and Thompson

The purpose of the meeting was to discuss two proposed changes in email:  first, to stop delivering mail to accounts when the disk quota was exceeded; second, to install a filter that would screen out files larger than 1MB.

After discussing these issues, the committee agreed to send Rod Welch the recommendations that appear below.  The recommendations, followed by Rod's response, will be published via email in the daily bulletin after spring break.

Computer Services Committee Recommendation Regarding Proposed Email Policy Changes

1. The committee notes that electronic communication is a regular and necessary part of our job, so we need access to reasonably fast email and the capability to send and receive whatever files are necessary as part of our scholarly work, our teaching, and the timely performance of our other school-related duties.  In other words, access to good electronic communication is a necessity, not a luxury.  We therefore recommend that adequate resources be devoted to maintaining and upgrading our email system.

2. With respect to the policy of stopping delivery to accounts that exceed their disk quota, we support the policy as a reasonable way to provide faster email;  however, we recognize that people who regularly receive high volumes or large files could be unduly hurt by the policy if their quota should fill up while they were out of town (for example, attending a conference or vacationing during a semester break).  Hence, we recommend that ITS create a way to send a automatic warning (via email, *not* simply a VAX message) to users who are approaching their quota, and that special arrangements be put in place to handle mail for professors who are unable to reach their accounts from periods of a week or longer.

3. With respect to the 1MB limit on files, we find that this policy would severely interfere with our scholarly and teaching duties.  Many professors send and receive articles and book chapters via email, and these messages can easily exceed 1MB, especially if they contain graphics.  Likewise, professors are increasingly having students turn in homework assignments via email, and assignments containing graphics can easily exceed 1MB.  We therefore recommend that ITS *not* implement a 1MB limit, though we acknowledge that a 5MB or 10MB limit might be large enough so as not to interfere with normal use of email.  We also recommend that ITS investigate the possibility of creating a "holding site" for messages that exceed the limit, so large messages could be siphoned off to the holding site and the recipients could be notified of waiting mail; messages  not retrieved after two weeks could then be deleted.

4. Finally, we see education as a key to having faculty do their part toward maintaining good electronic communications.  Specifically, we recommend that ITS provide classes to professors who use email-intensive classes or who regularly send or receive large files, educating them about ways to compress graphics files or make other modifications to help trim file sizes.  We recommend that ITS create handouts to address particular problems, and that these handouts be distributed in hard copy to departments and posted on the school web site.  We recommend that email reminders or "tips" on effective email use regularly be sent as part of the daily bulletin, both to faculty and staff and to students.