October 4, 2010
EAST LANSING, Mich. – A near-record crowd filled the conference room of the Michigan State University Union for the Fall 2010 meeting of the Merit Joint Technical Staff (MJTS) on Wednesday, September 29.
Adding to the excitement in the room was an interactive video connection to the University Center in Gaylord, which hosted several individuals who reside in Northern Michigan that found it easier to participate from Gaylord than in East Lansing. It was the first time in MJTS history in which a second interactive location was provided.
The interactive video connection enabled individuals in Gaylord to participate in the meeting throughout the day. Between the two sites and Merit staff, a total of 90 individuals from organizations across the state took part in the meeting.
“MJTS meetings are always lively gatherings. That is because of the information presented, and because of the great community which continues to grow from meeting to meeting,” said Elwood Downing, Merit’s vice president of member relations, communications, and services.
“This Fall’s meeting had a tremendous amount of excitement and energy,” he said. “I believe part of this is because of the two stimulus awards that Merit received for our REACH-3MC project, but also because of the superb caliber of presentations that captured the interest of Merit’s Membership.”
Downing began the presentations with an overview of REACH-3MC, both Rounds 1 and 2. Merit’s Director of Infrastructure Architecture and Strategy, Robert Duncan presented later in the day about the process of engineering the technologies and platform upon which the REACH-3MC network will be built.
One of the many compelling presentations throughout the day featured Brandon Sanders of Data Strategy, Inc. As virtualization becomes increasingly popular, many enterprise organizations are contemplating a move to virtualize. Sanders’ presentation provided virtualization sizing metrics and design best practices based on an 18-month study of implementations in Higher Education Institutions.
Other Fall MJTS presentations included: Tracking LAN connections with NetDB, DNSSEC: Background and Implementation Strategies, and Virtualization as a Service.