Peter M. Siegel is named director of Cornell Network and Computer Systems

After a two-year search, Peter M. Siegel has been named director of Cornell University Network and Computing Systems.

Siegel, who has been executive director and director of corporate partnership for Cornell's Center for Theory and Simulation in Science and Engineering, takes over responsibility for the university's voice, data and video networks, central computer systems and file servers at a time when all of those systems have become essential to the campus and when most of them are undergoing major changes.

Siegel will report directly to H. David Lambert, vice president for information technologies.

"Networking has become so dominant in corporations and universities, and the number of people who have that combination of technical savvy and political skills and leadership skills is very small," Lambert said, explaining why the recruiting process has taken so long. "It has been a real challenge, and I have been just so ecstatic that Pete has been willing to go after it. I think he will serve the university extraordinarily well in this work."

Lambert formerly held the post, which has been nominally vacant since he became vice president. He credits Cornell Information Technologies staff members Jim Doolittle, Dick Cogger and Carl Remon with taking up the slack.

The new director must face several challenges, including upgrading the university's campus network to carry telephone calls, computer data and video over a single unified system, living up to heightened expectations of users who now want their computer networks to be "as reliable as electricity," and finding ways to provide high-speed access for students, faculty and staff who live and sometimes work off campus.

Siegel must also follow through with Cornell's participation in the Next Generation Internet or "Internet 2," which will provide higher speed links between educational institutions. Siegel is already a member of the board of directors of NYSERnet, New York State's educational network, which is developing the state's section of Internet 2.

Siegel said he sees most of these as just larger versions of the networking responsibilities he has had at the Theory Center, but added that he sees his job as going beyond the internal needs of the campus.

"It's always very important to emphasize the role these technologies play on campus," Siegel said, "but Cornell is moving towards fulfilling some of the vision of being a window to the world, disseminating its tremendous amount of knowledge to the broader community."

He cited distance learning as an example of an application that requires both new technology and high reliability.

"One of the hardest things to do is to be sure the bandwidth is available when a professor needs it for teaching," he said. "When you get up in the morning and go to teach a class you want to know that the links will be there."

And, he said, improved networking "will help to create digital libraries that are more effective. Students will be able to use video presentations from classes and simulations as well as the more traditional things like textbooks and handouts."

Connectivity for off-campus users will have to come through partnerships with vendors and others in the community, he suggested, noting that much of his work with the Theory Center has been based on similar partnerships that led to donations of equipment and services.

"If Cornell said tomorrow that we're just going to do this on our own, it would break the bank," he said. "We have to work very carefully with community groups and vendors, convince them that when they work with us they will learn a lot."

Siegel sees no abrupt changes in direction. "We have a role to play in being leaders, but we also have to be extraordinarily good at understanding what the campus wants and needs," he said. "I want to spend some time understanding what the needs of the community are."

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