Reimagining … Reimagining … Reimagining …
Almost every time I travel from Cambridge to Boston, I cross the Longfellow Bridge. The central piers of the bridge feature four carved, ornamental stone towers, which give rise to another name for the bridge, the “Salt and Pepper Bridge,” which many of us still use. Originally opening in 1906, the bridge replaced previous bridges and ferry services going back to 1630. Since 2013 the bridge has been the subject of a $250 million restoration and rehabilitation effort which is expected to be completed in late 2018 or early 2019. When the work is completed, we’ll have a very beautiful bridge with the same capacity it had before the project began.
That isn’t how the IT world works. In the summer following my 1958 baccalaureate graduation, I was introduced to my first computer, an IBM 650 Magnetic Drum Data-Processing Machine. It had a 2000 word memory (signed 10 digit numbers or 5 characters per word), and a clock speed of about 12.5 ms. This machine occupied about 500 square feet of space, used punch cards for input and output, and required multiple operators for each of three shifts.
Even though its computing capabilities were miniscule by any measure today, it permitted users to do complicated computations, often overnight, that would have taken days and even weeks to do by hand. The project I worked on would not have been doable without it.
Today, the newest laptops have processors with about 3 billion transistors, clock speeds of over 3 Gb/s (about 300 million times faster than the 650), and up to 2 TB of memory. Quite a change from the first computer I encountered. So, while the Longfellow Bridge, after restoration, has basically the same functionality as it did when it was new over a century ago, changes in information technology have been disruptive and have had a significant impact on essentially everything that we do. And, they continue increasing capabilities at an exponential rate.
However, even in our computing world, we are having a difficult job of keeping up. For example, many of our universities have multiple large data centers with computers running large, complex applications often maintained by large staffs. Meanwhile their clients – students, faculty, and staff – are using smart handhelds and laptops with significant computing power wondering why they don’t have university applications more like the applications available on their handhelds.
If you take a few large steps back, you can understand why we basically have, at least, two models of computing clamoring for attention and resources. First there is the historic model of computing centers with central staffs to run large applications. Within a two to three decades of my experience with the IBM 650, companies such as Digital were producing machines with significant (for that day) computing power that were the size of a two-drawer filing cabinet. To the administrator or faculty member who was having trouble getting his or her work done via the central computing environment, this was an all too easy solution. And, they latched on to it creating clusters of computing resources across the campus. (And, I, too, did this in one of my pre-CIO roles.)
Then along came the handhelds and laptops which presented applications that were much more attractive and user friendly. While, all this was going on, computing and storage devices became so inexpensive that some companies began building very, very large data centers and then offering what became known as cloud services.
This is the computing environment that we find on essentially every campus today. And with it, we find many forces and trends at work to certainly evolve if not disrupt a campus’ IT environment. Among these include pressure to reduce costs, to improve security, to put more resources into academic and instructional IT, and to make computing easier to use and more “friendly.” These taken together clearly call for a rethinking, a real reimagining of how we do computing on our respective university campuses.
Today’s MOR’s 2017 Leaders Conference, Reimagining IT: The Journey Continues, is our effort to continue this important discussion with those individuals who are participating in the conference.
Do take this opportunity to begin, continue, or restart your thinking about how you will reimagine your journey. . . jim
Jim Bruce is a Senior Fellow and Executive Coach at MOR Associates, and Professor of Electrical Engineering, Emeritus, and CIO, Emeritus, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA.
- October 2024 (1)
- September 2024 (4)
- August 2024 (4)
- July 2024 (5)
- June 2024 (4)
- May 2024 (4)
- April 2024 (5)
- March 2024 (4)
- February 2024 (4)
- January 2024 (5)
- December 2023 (3)
- November 2023 (4)
- October 2023 (5)
- September 2023 (4)
- August 2023 (4)
- July 2023 (4)
- June 2023 (4)
- May 2023 (5)
- April 2023 (4)
- March 2023 (1)
- January 2023 (4)
- December 2022 (3)
- November 2022 (5)
- October 2022 (4)
- September 2022 (4)
- August 2022 (5)
- July 2022 (4)
- June 2022 (4)
- May 2022 (5)
- April 2022 (4)
- March 2022 (5)
- February 2022 (4)
- January 2022 (4)
- December 2021 (3)
- November 2021 (4)
- October 2021 (3)
- September 2021 (4)
- August 2021 (4)
- July 2021 (4)
- June 2021 (5)
- May 2021 (4)
- April 2021 (4)
- March 2021 (5)
- February 2021 (4)
- January 2021 (4)
- December 2020 (4)
- November 2020 (4)
- October 2020 (6)
- September 2020 (5)
- August 2020 (4)
- July 2020 (7)
- June 2020 (7)
- May 2020 (5)
- April 2020 (4)
- March 2020 (5)
- February 2020 (4)
- January 2020 (4)
- December 2019 (2)
- November 2019 (4)
- October 2019 (4)
- September 2019 (3)
- August 2019 (3)
- July 2019 (2)
- June 2019 (4)
- May 2019 (3)
- April 2019 (5)
- March 2019 (4)
- February 2019 (3)
- January 2019 (5)
- December 2018 (2)
- November 2018 (4)
- October 2018 (5)
- September 2018 (3)
- August 2018 (3)
- July 2018 (4)
- June 2018 (4)
- May 2018 (5)
- April 2018 (4)
- March 2018 (5)
- February 2018 (5)
- January 2018 (3)
- December 2017 (3)
- November 2017 (4)
- October 2017 (5)
- September 2017 (3)
- August 2017 (5)
- July 2017 (3)
- June 2017 (8)
- May 2017 (5)
- April 2017 (4)
- March 2017 (4)
- February 2017 (4)
- January 2017 (4)
- December 2016 (2)
- November 2016 (7)
- October 2016 (5)
- September 2016 (8)
- August 2016 (5)
- July 2016 (4)
- June 2016 (12)
- May 2016 (5)
- April 2016 (4)
- March 2016 (7)
- February 2016 (4)
- January 2016 (10)
- December 2015 (4)
- November 2015 (6)
- October 2015 (4)
- September 2015 (7)
- August 2015 (5)
- July 2015 (6)
- June 2015 (12)
- May 2015 (4)
- April 2015 (6)
- March 2015 (10)
- February 2015 (4)
- January 2015 (4)
- December 2014 (3)
- November 2014 (5)
- October 2014 (4)
- September 2014 (6)
- August 2014 (4)
- July 2014 (4)
- June 2014 (4)
- May 2014 (5)
- April 2014 (5)
- March 2014 (5)
- February 2014 (4)
- January 2014 (5)
- December 2013 (5)
- November 2013 (5)
- October 2013 (10)
- September 2013 (4)
- August 2013 (5)
- July 2013 (8)
- June 2013 (6)
- May 2013 (4)
- April 2013 (5)
- March 2013 (4)
- February 2013 (4)
- January 2013 (5)
- December 2012 (3)
- November 2012 (4)
- October 2012 (5)
- September 2012 (4)
- August 2012 (4)
- July 2012 (5)
- June 2012 (4)
- May 2012 (5)
- April 2012 (4)
- March 2012 (4)
- February 2012 (4)
- January 2012 (4)
- December 2011 (3)
- November 2011 (5)
- October 2011 (4)
- September 2011 (4)
- August 2011 (4)
- July 2011 (4)
- June 2011 (5)
- May 2011 (5)
- April 2011 (3)
- March 2011 (4)
- February 2011 (4)
- January 2011 (4)
- December 2010 (3)
- November 2010 (4)
- October 2010 (4)
- September 2010 (3)
- August 2010 (5)
- July 2010 (4)
- June 2010 (5)
- May 2010 (4)
- April 2010 (3)
- March 2010 (2)
- February 2010 (4)
- January 2010 (4)
- December 2009 (4)
- November 2009 (4)
- October 2009 (4)
- September 2009 (4)
- August 2009 (3)
- July 2009 (3)
- June 2009 (3)
- May 2009 (4)
- April 2009 (4)
- March 2009 (2)
- February 2009 (3)
- January 2009 (3)
- December 2008 (3)
- November 2008 (3)
- October 2008 (3)
- August 2008 (3)
- July 2008 (4)
- May 2008 (2)
- April 2008 (2)
- March 2008 (2)
- February 2008 (1)
- January 2008 (1)
- December 2007 (3)
- November 2007 (3)
- October 2007 (3)
- September 2007 (1)
- August 2007 (2)
- July 2007 (4)
- June 2007 (2)
- May 2007 (3)
- April 2007 (1)
- March 2007 (2)
- February 2007 (2)
- January 2007 (3)
- December 2006 (1)
- November 2006 (1)
- October 2006 (1)
- September 2006 (3)
- August 2006 (1)
- June 2006 (2)
- April 2006 (1)
- March 2006 (1)
- February 2006 (1)
- January 2006 (1)
- December 2005 (1)
- November 2005 (2)
- October 2005 (1)
- August 2005 (1)
- July 2005 (1)
- April 2005 (2)
- March 2005 (4)
- February 2005 (2)
- December 2004 (1)