Two years of work and planning have resulted in the renovation of Heady Hall's public computer lab, located in room 64. Freshly painted walls, new furniture, and new carpet set the stage for eighteen flat screen monitors and accompanying thin clients - a modernized set-up which now makes it comfortable for students to access, and efficient for staff to support.

The use of thin clients in the lab was prompted by Alex Zhylyevskyy, assistant professor in the Department of Economics, as a more efficient option than a stand-alone PC.

“PCs require more maintenance time,” he says. “Several years ago we started to realize that we didn’t have the staff to manage the old system.”

Thin clients provide a more effective solution. Connected to a terminal server, each unit contains no individual hard drive or moving parts. Simply put, it’s a “stripped-down computer,” says Zhylyevskyy, that offers access to software and internet through the server.

The small unit also takes up less space, allowing the lab to expand from twelve user stations to eighteen. And because the thin client contains no hard drive, it’s less likely to break down than a conventional PC.

Proposals were written by Zhylyevskyy and Mike Long, systems analyst with Economics and CARD, and were approved by several funding sources, including the ISU’s Computation Advisory Committee (CAC), LAS Computation Advisory Committee (LASCAC), and departmental computer committees of the Departments of Economics and Sociology. Two terminal servers and a total of sixty-six thin clients were funded, with the remaining forty eight clients to be installed in Heady’s accompanying lab in room 68 during the spring semester.

Dwight Dake, systems support specialist with the Department of Sociology, and Brent Moore, systems analyst with LAS, provided additional assistance with the proposals, and Jared Hetzler and Sarah Harrington, student IT technicians, assisted in the physical setup.

“It was a major endeavor,” says Zhylyevskyy, content with the outcome after years of planning and fundraising. “It’s an efficient and modern set-up.”