David Cook
Director
512-232-3782
MAI 2610, Mail code: G2326
Applications
The Applications unit develops, evaluates and provides tools and infrastructure for information systems, including resources for the retention, management and access of university records and the framework and support for UT Direct, the university's secure portal to administrative services.
Community Solutions
The Community Solutions team oversees a suite of enterprise software applications that serve the campus business community, serving the enterprise business needs of campus administrative developers and support personnel. Our suite of services focus primarily on eCommunications and Workflow Management: Group Email, programmatic mail (EMN$INET and EMN$HTML), secure messaging, the Directory Open Records Request system, the Department Contact function of the university Department System; electronic document routing, security and infrastructure (DEFINE Internals), including the Electronic Inbox and other workflow tools for both financial and non-account-based documents, plus configuration and global data handling for *DEFINE and many DEFINE-related, web-based ERP functions. We also retain responsibility for a large part of the university's eCommerce infrastructure (online retail via TX Shop as well as back-end Credit Card Processing), as well as several legacy mainframe applications still in significant use (TXMAIL, TXSEND).
Finally, as part of our work, we are investigating unified workflow and communications tools, including the Kuali higher ed community source ERP system, while also doing our part to address ownership issues with key enterprise applications including TXShop and the Department System.
Identity and Access Management
Many of you know the Identify and Access Management (IAM) team as the EID team but that's just the surface of what IAM does. The IAM team has responsibility for the central authentication, authorization, directory and identity management systems for the university. The team manages over 4 million records in the core campus identity management system, known as the uTexas Identity Manager (TIM). Our directory services (TED - uTexas Enterprise Directory, TOM - TED on the mainframe, WHIPS - White Pages Directory) are central repositories of identity details that are accessible to campus systems.
The current suite of authentication products include EID authentication services for mainframe-based services and cookie-based authentication for web services not operating on the UT Direct servers. This year a new authentication service will be released that will provide secure, robust, cross-platform authentication with consistent session management. Our authorization products include Apollo, a mainframe authorization repository with customizable application profiles and group management functionality, and *DPUSER, an authorization system for mainframe services including the management of Natural and Adabas resources. The IAM team also supports the ID Center by maintaining the ID Card system and the Official Visitor system.
Contract and Departmental Solutions
The Contract and Departmental Solutions team provides application development for ITS administrative applications and contract services for departments. Our administrative services focus on providing users with access to the many services ITS offers. Among these services are those that allow for students, faculty, and staff to order, manage, and pay for core services such as email accounts and disk storage space through TRAC; telephone, voicemail service, and Internet wiring through MySoft and Smartvoice; and software through Software Distributions and Sales. The contract service we provide allows departments that don't have their own software developers to have customized applications built for their needs. These applications include a suite of academic services for the Jackson School of Geosciences; AdGrad, a social networking site for the Advertising department in the College of Communications; and Odonata Central, an application developed to assist Dr. John Abbott with his research of dragonflies and damselflies. Many of you were familiar with the Agile Contracts Team (ACT) in ITS Applications. While this team does not exist formally anymore we still do contract development, it's just not focused within one team.
Web Technologies
The Web Technologies Team maintains a publishing infrastructure for the university's primary Web server, Web Central, and the university's portal, UT Direct. We provide tools, consulting, and technical documentation to assist webmasters and Web developers throughout campus. These tools include Web scanning and monitoring tools (Urchin and WebXM), search tools (htdig), templates, content management (Oracle), database service (MySQL), and various Web publishing utilities. The team also provides accessibility and usability consulting and services to campus webmasters, as well as content development, Web design, virtual hosting service, digital video, and multimedia projects for campus departments.
Application Security Team
The Application Security Team (AST) supports secure software application development practices on campus. We develop and deliver courses and guidelines (e.g. Secure Application Development in PHP), provide access to and expertise in the use of supporting tools and technologies (e.g. AppScan Enterprise), and develop and maintain associated systems and tools (e.g. the Application Registry). The team provides also provides expertise in testing web applications for security vulnerabilities.
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