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4 Application Services (SLA J4)

4.1 Videoconferencing Service (SLA J4.1) [more information]

The number of users of this service continues to grow steadily. Currently 6109 of the registered venues are able to use the JANET Videoconferencing Service over IP (JVCS-IP) and 655 are able to use the service over ISDN (JVCS-ISDN). During the reporting period, 101 conferences took place using ISDN only over 182 hours, 4496 conferences took place using IP only over 5440 hours, and 2760 conferences took place using the IP/ISDN gateway over 4830 hours. As expected, usage dropped during December and has begun to gather pace again. The overall statistical trend indicates an increase in the use of videoconferencing, particularly IP videoconferencing.

JVCS (more information)

JVCS Desktop Videoconferencing

A new desktop videoconferencing feature called JVCS Desktop has been integrated into the Booking Service and is now available to the JANET community.

JVCS Desktop is an application which is available to registered users of the JANET Videoconferencing Service (JVCS). It allows users to participate in a booked videoconference (containing as least one registered Booking Service venue) without having to use special hardware or software endpoints to connect to the conference. All a user needs is a Windows desktop or laptop, a webcam and headset with microphone to join in.

Bringing a user in using JVCS Desktop is as easy as bringing in any other guest. The conference booker needs the following information about their JVCS Desktop participants: name, organisation and email address. JVCS Desktop attendees then receive an email with a link to a small piece of software they need to download (only once) to use the feature and a link to join the conference itself.

For details on how to use this feature see the user guide: Videoconferencing with JVCS Desktop Endpoints.

4.2 Access Grid Support Service (SLA J4.2) [more information]

The Access Grid® Support Centre continues to support the users of the Access Grid® within the UK academic network, with the aim of improving user experience through robust and resilient services.

Server and Bridge Activity

The number of registered UK Access Grid nodes currently stands at 400, including the UK Academic desktop nodes, and the number of users stands at 682. The AGSC is investigating how to trace server usage that it believes is higher than indicated but is currently unable to measure.

Booking Service

There were 1345 uses of Access Grid during January 2010, discounting meetings under two minutes. This is higher than December’s 923. The end of the Christmas break and the bad weather earlier in the month may have contributed to the lower usage.

Conferences & Outreaches

The AGSC attended the RSC-NW Using New and Emerging Technologies (uNet) conference at Aintree in Liverpool, speaking to delegates and demonstrating Access Grid technology from the JANET Videoconferencing stand.

The AGSC also ran a demonstration day on 12 November. The day was well attended and included participants from JISC RSC and the principal of Langdon College. Langdon is a specialist independent college and is keen to use Access Grid technology to communicate with the other seven independent colleges in the North West area.

In December Access Grid and IOCOM were demonstrated to the UCL Business School, which is interested in remotely lecturing some of its courses. Access Grid and its technologies were also demonstrated to a delegation from the Ministry of Education for Brunei during the open session held on 19 January.

Customer Survey

An informal AGSC telephone survey was started in November 2009. So far 35 nodes have been contacted. The aims of the survey are:

• raise visibility of AGSC to our users
• confirm we have up-to-date details about the nodes, including number of nodes, correct contact details etc.
• establish if the technology is being used (or if not, why not) and offer our services to resolve any problems
• establish what types of meetings are taking place
• reminder to users of the services AGSC can offer.

Documentation

The newly revised documents Installing the Access Grid Toolkit, Introduction to IOCOM Tools and Introduction to Access Grid Toolkit Tools have been added to the growing number of documents on the AGSC website. Suggestions from the Access Grid community on what other documentation should appear on the site may be submitted to the AGSC via telephone or email.

EVO (Enabling Virtual Organizations)

The new version of EVO, which is to be released soon, has been tested and evaluation comments passed back to the developers. The enhancements in the new version will include:

• a simpler interface
• a new icon toolbar
• improvements to videoconferencing (H.323) connectivity
• improved booking options.

A further announcement will be made on the AGSC website before these changes go live, at http://www.ja.net/services/video/agsc/AGSCHome/whatsnew.html.

An updated Beginner's Guide to Using Evo has been published on the AGSC Website. It builds on the version that is already available but has more information about how to have a meeting, and how to use the audio and video tools.

4.3 Usenet News Service (SLA J4.3) [more information]

There are now few active registered News Feed and News Read users and the current infrastructure is nearing its end of life. JANET(UK) has therefore decided that it is no longer economically viable to run the service, especially in the current financial climate. We therefore will cease to offer the service when the existing contract expires on 31 July 2010.

4.3.1 News Feed Service (SLA J4.1) [more information]

The News Feed Service continues to function well. There are currently 20 client sites connected to the service and most are taking a full News feed.

4.3.2 News Reader Service (SLA J4.1) [more information]

The News Reader Service continues to function well. There are currently 47 sites connected to the Service.

4.4 Electronic Mail Services (SLA J4.4)

4.4.1 Mailer Shield (SLA J4.4.1) [more information]

No more organisations have joined this service during this reporting period. After rationalisation of records for this service, the number of active recorded clients of the service is 19.

4.4.2 E-mail Advice and Testing Service (SLA J4.4.2) [more information]

The system continues to run reliably and effectively.

4.4.3 E-mail Abuse Protection Service (SLA J4.4.3) [more information]

The system continues to run reliably and effectively.

4.4.4 Web Mail Service (SLA J4.4.4) [more information]

There are a total of 36 sites using the service.

4.6 Nameserver Services (SLA J4.6)

4.6.1 Second Level Domain Service (SLA J4.6.1)

DNS (Servers)
The JANET DNS service continued to run reliably with no problems encountered during this quarter.

DNS (Whois Service)
During the reporting period there were no reported problems with whois.ja.net.

4.6.2 Primary Nameserver Service (SLA J4.6.2) [more information]

Two more organisations registered during the reporting period to use the JANET Primary Nameserver service. There are now a total of 109 users of the service.

4.6.3 Secondary Nameserver Service (SLA J4.6.3) [more information]

There have been no breaks of service within this quarterly period. At the end of this reporting period the number of organisations using this service had increased to 525.

4.6.4 Off-site Resolver Service (SLA J4.6.4) [more information]

Five sites joined during the reporting period taking the total number of users up to 110.

4.7 Managed Router Service (SLA J4.7) [more information]

Nothing to report.

4.8 Web-Based Services (SLA J4.8)

4.8.1 Web Hosting Service (SLA J4.8.1) [more information]

Three sites left the service during the reporting period, bringing the total number of sites using the service to 73.

4.8.2 Web Filtering Service (SLA J4.8.2) [more information]

During the past reporting period 3 organisations joined the service. A few organisations have elected to have two filtering accounts. There are currently 91 individual organisations using the service.

4.9 JANET Roaming Service (SLA J4.9) [more information]

The number of participating organisations is now 110, representing the major proportion of the higher education sector.

The release by OpenSEA of the stable version 2.2.0 of the open source 802.1X supplicant for Windows XP and Linux provides a much broader range of features than the built-in Windows 802.1X supplicant software. JANET(UK) will continue to support OpenSEA development activity and become involved in testing the Vista version which is planned for release shortly.

A newly redesigned JANET Roaming home web page now steers visitors more effectively towards information they seek based on the type of visitor – user, administrator or management.

4.10 UK Access Management Federation [more information]

4.10.1 Membership of the UK federation

At the end of January there were 780 members in the UK federation, made up of organisations from UK education sectors and of commercial organisations providing online services to these sectors. A list of services available through the federation can be found at http://www.ukfederation.org.uk/content/Documents/AvailableServices.

4.10.2 UK federation Support, Training and Events [more information]

Documentation is now available on the UK federation website providing instructions for how to upgrade to Shibboleth 2. The UK federation will continue to support members with Shibboleth version 1.3 beyond June 2010: however, Internet2 developers will not issue any new security patches after this date.

The Shibboleth implementation courses continue to be very popular and are run on a cost recovery basis only. Further details of the training schedule can be found at http://www.ja.net/services/training/schedule/by-course.html.