Web Programming and Site Maintenance

General Support and Maintenance

The web team at HSPH provides the following service to the HSPH community without charge:

• Maintenance and design of central pages
• General web troubleshooting and assistance
• Application programming for central offices and groups
• Assistance with configuring web pages for web streaming
• Consulting on web projects to be hosted at HSPH
• Consulting and assistance with web technology that require the use of Harvard PIN, Harvard courseware, Harvard credit card service, MyHSPH/Isites or LDAP
• Training on a variety of supported software (Isites, HSPH CMS (launch during fall 2006)

Fee-for-service

In addition to providing general support and maintenance, the web team is available on a fee-for- service basis for departments, centers, and faculty member projects as time permits.

This work is billed at a rate of $70/hour.

Each project is quoted after an initial meeting to discuss the project goals, objectives, and requirements.

A portfolio of projects is being developed. 

Preferred Vendors

The HSPH Department of Information Technology has worked with several web consulting groups with significant experience with working within HSPH/Harvard environment. If you have a large project that requires dedicated programming, we can assist you with finding a vendor that meets your needs and fits well with technology in place at HSPH.

Website Hosting

Hosting:

HSPH offers basic hosting of websites free of charge for departments, centers, faculty members, research projects, offices and other operations of the school across many different servers. Disk quota for any user account is 100 MB. Additional space is charged at the rate of $11/MB/YR.

The HSPH web site is housed acrossed many servers including:

1. Main web server
   http://www.hsph.harvard.edu
   
   This server is suitable for basic web sites that utilize HTML, CSS, graphic files, PDF, Microsoft, MP3 or any other type of file downloads, etc.
   
   Technology: UNIX/SOLARIS/APACHE and limited applications that utilize PERL/CGI.
2. Application web servers
   https://webapps.sph.harvard.edu
   https://cfserver.sph.harvard.edu
   
   These servers are suitable for interactive applications that create dynamic results, publish static pages to the main web server, save data to a database, intereract with other systems around the school and University
   
   Technology: LINUX/APACHE/SSL/PGP/COLD FUSION MX 7
   
   HSPH Web Team has established practices for working with Harvard PIN, LDAP, Harvard Credit Card System, Isite and Icommons Custom Tool Creation, Registrar's Office SIS through previous projects.
   
   Requirements: Employees and/or consultants utilizing programming resources must be skilled in programming and application security. All programs will be reviewed by HSPH web team prior to launching applications. All projects should begin with a consultation with the web team as many applications are recyclable and can be repurposed. A list of preferred vendors is available for large projects.

1. Database server
   This server provides the database engine for database driven websites and interacts with our application web servers.
   
   Technology: WINDOWS/MS SQL 2000
2. Google server
   http://search.sph.harvard.edu
   This server is HSPH's custom Google search appliance. It indexes HSPH on a weekly basis. Synonyms, key words, custom weighting and excluding of sites is available.
3. Video servers
   HSPH has two video servers that run RealNetwork's Helix software for live and on-demand video streaming of events and courses. These servers interact with Media Service's Accordent Capture Stations and Anystream Apreso capture stations that are located in the HSPH control room. Each server has a 60 concurrent user license.
4. Future servers
   HSPH is upgrading its application servers to CF Enterprise Edition which will enable load balancing and add java server pages (JSP) as an acceptable middleware language choice for hosting at HSPH. It will also enable J2EE applications to run for more advanced applications. The first new application server was installed in late-August 2006. Once application servers have been upgraded, a more formal staging server will be established. Redundant SQL servers are also planned.
5. Cambridge servers
   The web operation at HSPH also relies upon services of the university that are hosted on central servers. These servers includes Isites/MyHSPH and courseware, PIN/LDAP, and Harvard Credit Card Service.

Web Portfolio

The web portfolio contains a plethora of clients and technologies spanning multiple facets of the the entire school and web technologies.