The Office of Information Technologies (OIT), which provides Internet services for Pomona College, is looking for a new Internet server after ongoing student and faculty complaints about the unreliability of the current server. In recent months, Pomona’s VMS-based e-mail server has failed up to once a week, disrupting e-mail services for Pomona faculty and students. OIT hopes to install either a Windows NT or Unix system by spring 2000, finally discarding the server that has been in place since 1989.

Director for OIT Terris Wolf said, "I understand the server is going down; it is my complaint to my staff, but part of the problem is the huge amount of space it’s taking to send MP3s around the system."

Over the past couple of years, the e-mail system’s capabilities have been greatly taxed due to the increasing number of large files being sent via the network. Among those large files are MP3s, used to transport movies and music across the Internet.

As a result, any big file sent through VMS can crash the server. This causes much frustration for OIT personnel. Wolf said, "We’d like to be able to facilitate large e-mail messages, but the system we’ve been running on since ‘89 isn’t designed to deal with email as we know today."

Communications Commissioner Emeka Okereke said, "[The VMS system] is like Sanskrit," he explained that with the increase in the technology the current, outdated server cannot handle all the applications today, but a more technologically advanced server would. "The new system should make it so the e-mail doesn’t crash," he said.

Currently, each student has one and a quarter megabytes of email on the VMS system plus ten megabytes on the Novell network. However, e-mail cannot be accessed through Novel. The new server OIT hopes to install will have 10-20 megabytes e-mail space, ten to twenty times more space than the old server.

Wolf described a recent incident when a student received an 80 to 90 megabyte file that crashed Pomona’s server. "We‘ve talked about limiting size of mail messages," Wolf said, "but we haven’t done it because we’re not sure how exactly we should cut the sizes." He continued, "I don’t think students know the dangers [of sending big files]."

Many teachers depend on the ability to send large files for their classes. Todd Anderson ’03 said, "Some teachers use a lot of memory with their mailing things."

The $50 annual service charge for the server connection is another aspect of OIT that bothers many students. Pam Grewal ’03 said, "We pay fifty dollars for a connection that doesn’t work when at other schools, the server always works and students don’t have to pay any extra money at all."

Recently, the business office and trustees approved a flat fee of $50. The administrative costs of tracking students, OIT claims, are the same for one and two semesters. In addition, OIT needed funding for students’ request such as printers. As a result of the increase in funds, OIT was able to purchase two new printers for SACS and new equipment for dorms. The $50 fee also allows for an increased print quota and access to the network.

Though there are many student complaints, students for the most part are looking forward to a new system and a better year.

One student, Sean Gilbert ’03, is optimistic about the process, "I don’t know why they shut it down–if there was a technical problem, those problems happen, you just have to deal with them."