Service Level Agreements (Research)

1.0 Purpose

2.0 Term and Scope of Agreement

3.0 Scope of Service

4.0 Support Levels

5.0 Hardware

6.0 Supported Operating Systems

7.0 Software

8.0 User Responsibility

9.0 Pharmacy High Performance Cluster (HPC) Support

1.0 Purpose

Western University Information and Technology department (IT) provides services and support to the Western University (WU) community.  The purpose of this document is to clarify roles, expectations, and provide mechanisms for resolving issues. This agreement covers employees designated as Research Faculty (Principal Investigator, PI) and Staff, as determined by the University Vice President for Research. Such designations are re-evaluated annually.

2.0 Term and Scope of Agreement

IT and the WU user community agree to work together with mutual respect and courtesy.

IT clients should contact the Help Desk with requests for software, hardware, network and telecommunications services. Help Desk requests for assistance will be handled according to assigned priority and staff availability. IT acknowledges that research-related services are often of higher priority, due to grant application time lines and experimental schedules. The Research Support Specialist (as designated by IT) has as their primary responsibility (on priority 1’s Standard tickets will be handle on next available) the resolution of such research-related issues.

IT will not be responsible for loss of data on laptops or workstations. All university data should be stored on University servers. Sharepoint, OneDrive. See the Data Backups Policy and the Storage of Confidential Information Policy. Exceptions: The IT Research Support Specialist is available to assist researchers in setting up individual backup solutions in those cases where network backup is not possible(can set up,  and train,  not responsible) (e.g non-standard configuration) or desired for experimental reasons (e.g. backups must be performed manually or when experiments are not running; many users on one machine precludes individual backups, computer is not networked, etc).

IT is not responsible for loss of productivity due to hardware or software issues. IT and the Research Support Specialist acknowledge that individuals performing research and research-related work (e.g. grant and scientific publication preparation) often work under strict schedules and severe time constraints, and thus will make every attempt to avoid disruptions of research due to computer and network problems.  (Not necessary if this is a priority 1 it will be handled as all priority 1.  Tickets that could have been scheduled will not be handled as a priority)

3.0 Scope of Service

3.1 Support Environment

IT provides technical support for all IT approved computers, telephone equipment, software, printers, and other peripherals owned by the University. In addition, the Research Support Specialist provides support for equipment used by researchers if the equipment was brought to the University as part of the researchers move to the University or is the personal property of the researcher but is used for research-related purposes. Equipment will be labeled and will be supported to the best of the ability of the research specialist, example – not able to work on warranty parts if equipment is not under university purchasing (Equipment purchased after the research has arrived on campus must meet western University standards in order to be supported)

 IT provides technical support for network and Internet access.

IT provides installation, maintenance, training and troubleshooting for supported software. The Research Support Specialist provides support for all research-related software in use in laboratories at the University.  (Software mush to brought to IT attention so it can be tested and documented before support)

4.0 Support Levels

Descriptions:

• First contact: Amount of time allotted for technician to call to set up an appointment
• Technician Assisted Troubleshooting: Amount of time allotted for technician to begin resolving the issue
• Task complete: Amount of time allotted for task to be resolved and completed

Exceptions:

Due to the high volume of calls during the opening weeks of school, finals and other peak volume weeks, response times may be longer than normal. IT staff will inform end users if such an exception is necessary. Due to the nature of some issues, such as, but not limited to: OS corruptions, virus removals, and hardware failure, task completion times might take longer than posted to complete. Some task completions might be delayed due to scheduling conflicts between technician and user.

  * Response time definition: The amount of time the IT department will take for the initial customer contact. Critical research-related issues (as determined by the VP for Research in consolation with the PI) may require resolution by the Research Support Specialist according to the listed response time.    (for support equipment only,  non standard equipment, because of issue with warranty and parts, may take long to resolve due to not standard procedures)

5.0 Hardware

Due to issues of maintenance, troubleshooting, and system stability, unsupported hardware will not be installed unless specifically authorized by the IT Department management.  Although the IT Department does not guarantee service on any non-IT authorized or out of warranty equipment,  This equipment will be worked on a best-efforts basis. IT acknowledges that research often involves the use of non-standard hardware configurations. The Research Support Specialist will be responsible for maintaining and repair of all such research-related systems, in accordance with the standard Support Levels (above).  (if equipment is non standard,  it will still need to be best effort and restricted to warranty)

6.0 Supported Operating Systems

 IT acknowledges that research may involve the use of older Windows, Macintosh, Linux systems, etc. The Research Support Specialist will evaluate the system support possibilities, availability and recommendation.

Certain functionality cannot be used by non standard OS and so in certain situations issue may not be able to be resolved. 

7.0 Software

Since conducting research often requires frequent hardware and/or software changes during installation and/or troubleshooting, researchers may be granted Power User or Administrator rights to individual machines upon approval by the IT management team.

 7.2 Other Software

Due to issues of maintenance, troubleshooting, and system stability, unsupported software will not be installed on WU systems, unless specifically authorized by the IT Department. IT is not responsible for the loss of data or productivity due to installation on unsupported software. Unsupported software will be handled on a best-efforts basis.

7.3 Software Licensing

All software purchased for University use must have a valid license on record for each installation instance, unless licenses are not necessary (e.g. open source software). Any unlicensed software is subject to removal only after consultation with the VP for Research. (All software will be installed by designated employees or by research specialist)

8.0 User Responsibility

Users can help keep their computers running smoothly and can make it easier for IT to assist them by doing a few simple things. The end user responsibilities include the following:

Reporting Problems

•           Report service problems promptly through proper channels. This means     contacting the Help Desk via phone, e-mail, or online form.

Availability

•           Provide IT with access to offices and computer equipment as needed.

Maintenance Tasks

•           Be aware of Phishing attempts, do not open or click on unknown suspicious files and links.
•           Run Windows updates (or Mac updates) on a regular basis to insure a secure and  stable system.
•           Store University files on a network storage space such OneDrive and Sharepoint sites.
•           Consult IT department before installing any software on laptops and workstations.

Data Safeguarding

•          Maintain confidentiality of University data.
•           Use strong passwords.
•           Do not write down or share your password.
•          Review data security responsibilities annually by taking Basic Computer Security Course.

Communication

•           Consult with IT before purchasing software or hardware.
•           All moves of, or changes to, equipment/software must be reported and approved   by IT.
•           Departments should relay to the Help Desk any personnel changes, so that equipment and accounts can be properly maintained and security holes narrowed.

9.0 Pharmacy High Performance Cluster (HPC) Support

PI: Dr. Lyna Luo 

All primary first level support should go through the vendors "EXXACT" and "Bright Computing"  Information Technology team is responsible to provide HPC with network and external/remote connection.,

Any hardware, software issue should first be reported to the vendors. IT and Research Support Specialist tech should be contacted as a secondary support when the vendors have identified need of assistance from IT. 

IT is not responsible for data backup or any data loss.  Data backup cost and solution should be provided by PI (Dr. Lyna Luo) and the Pharmacy department.