Advantages and disadvantages of decentralized computing services

ABSTRACT

As computers expand further and further into all academic communities, so must the user services group. However, this expansion places a burden on a centralized computer center, and therefore, it is not surprising to see a trend developing in many large universities where the primary user services function is transferred from the main computer center to colleges and departments within the university. This results in the main computer center providing secondary user services and the college or department providing primary user services. Such is the situation at the University of South Carolina.

The University is the largest in the State of South Carolina with approximately 35,000 students enrolled. For many years certain computing services functions have been the responsibility of the various colleges within the university, although the main computing center provides some short courses on programming languages, programming packages, and utilities plus, a newsletter, limited consulting, and technical support. The bulk of the teaching, consulting, and dissemination of information is the responsibility of the individual colleges within the university.

This paper will discuss the problems encountered in establishing an individual college computing center as well as its advantages and disadvantages based on our experiences at the college or department level.

Index Terms

• Social and professional topics

  • Professional topics

    • Management of computing and information systems

      • System management

        • Centralization / decentralization