Introduction

The Joint Universities Computer Centre (JUCC) is a cooperative effort of the Computer Centres of the eight government-funded tertiary institutions in Hong Kong. 

Objective of JUCC

JUCC's primary objective is to provide computing and information technology services for its members with an aim to further the development of information technology and services in the education community in Hong Kong. Being the consortium of all the tertiary institutions of Hong Kong, the mission of the JUCC is to contribute to the development and application of IT in the education community in Hong Kong, to support the students, teachers, researchers and administrators in their pursuit of education and research excellence and to serve academia in the nearby region.

History

JUCC was first incorporated in September 1970. The aim of forming JUCC was to provide a comprehensive computing service to the two universities at that time, namely, The University of Hong Kong and The Chinese University of Hong Kong. With the establishment of more tertiary institutions in the subsequent years, the size of JUCC membership kept on growing. By now, JUCC has a total of eight full members. 

The member institutions are:

• The University of Hong Kong

  • Computer Centre
     

• The Chinese University of Hong Kong

  • Information Technology Services Centre
     

• The Hong Kong Polytechnic University

  • Information Technology Services Office
     

• City University of Hong Kong

  • Computing Services Centre
     

• Hong Kong Baptist University

  • Information Technology Services Centre
     

• The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

  • Information Technology Services Center
     

• Lingnan University

  • Information Technology Services Centre
     

• The Hong Kong Institute of Education

  • Office of Information Technology and Services
     

Functions and Services

After years of development and reorganization, JUCC has now become the centre for coordinating information technology services of mutual interest for all the tertiary educational institutions. JUCC plays an active role in co-ordinating joint institutional collaborations and innovative projects leading to the development and advancement of IT facilities and services for the academic and research community in Hong Kong. It builds, plans and manages the development and operations of HARNET, the academic and research network of Hong Kong, providing the local academic community with high-speed next-generation Optical backbone network and connectivies to the Internet and the Internet2. JUCC's on-going function is to coordinate information technology services of mutual interest for its member institutions. Services offered by JUCC include bulk tendering and purchasing of hardware, site licensing of software, special interest groups joint participation in training courses and IT conferences.

Besides serving the eight member institutions, JUCC also provides services to its three affiliate members, 

• The Open University of Hong Kong

• Vocational Training Council

• University of Macau

and to other institutions including the Hong Kong Examinations and Assement Authority and the Hong Kong Science and Technology Parks. 

Also, the assignment of .edu.hk domain names under the top level .hk domain is currently administered by JUCC. 

Management

The management of the business and the control of JUCC is vested in the Board of Management, chaired by Mr. C. Graeme Large. A Steering Committee, represented by the Directors of the Computer Centres of the eight members, oversees the operation of JUCC. The Steering Committee meets regularly to discuss and plan for the development of the Centre. Mr Philip Leung, Director of Information Technology Services Centre, The Chinese University of Hong Kong is currently Chairman of the Steering Committee and also serves as the Director of JUCC. The JUCC office is located at The University of Hong Kong. 

Achievements

JUCC has successfully demonstrated co-operations among tertiary institutions in Hong Kong for the past three decades. It is a good example which demonstrates a close collaborative efforts of the institutions for the betterment of the education community. Today, through JUCC's coordination, members are enjoying a wide range of services in a very cost-effective manner. JUCC continues to be a forum for information interchange among the computer centres of the tertiary institutions in Hong Kong. Through its joint negotiation effort, both in hardware and software tendering and purchases, JUCC helps to generate substantial savings for its members.

Pioneer in .hk Internet Domain Name Administration

JUCC is a forerunner in the development of Internet technology and Internet domain name administration. It has served as the Hong Kong Network Information Centre (HKNIC), administering the registration of second-level domain names under the top-level domain .hk for a decade starting from 1992 until the operation was handed over in 2002 to a new organization, Hong Kong Internet Registration Corporation Limited (HKIRC), formed by academia, the HKSAR Government and the infomation technology, commercial and legal sectors to take care of the .hk domain name registration.

Collaborations with Universities in China

Through visits to various Universities in the mainland China and organizing joint workshops with them, JUCC has initiated much fruitful interaction, exchange and sharing of experience on the latest IT infrastructure and technology development with the network experts and academia in China.

HARNET

One of the significant achievements of JUCC was the formation of the Hong Kong Academic and Research Network (HARNET). Established in 1985 and first connected to Internet in 1991, HARNET is operated and managed by JUCC. HARNET is the high-speed wide-area-network backbone which links up the campus networks of the JUCC member institutions. It provides an international Internet gateway for connecting to overseas academic and research networks.

HARNET provides indispensable Internet network services to university professors and students so that they can communicate conveniently and collaborate with academic counterparts locally and internationally. These network services include electronic mail, access to library databases, bulletin board services, web-based courses, distance learning, tele-medicine, multimedia application and video-conferencing.

JUCC has a new initiative to develop an up-to-date Wi-Fi network infrastructure for the UGC-funded institutions to enable information access mobility access campuses. This is a joint collaboration of JUCC institution in support of the Hong Kong SAR Government’s mission of building a Wi-Fi City in Hong Kong.

Besides the eight local tertiary institutions, HARNET also provides network connectivity to its affiliate members and network members.

HARNET Connectivity to Internet2

JUCC has successfully connected HARNET to Internet2 in October 2002 through a 45 Mbps link to Abilene of the U.S. via the STARTAP (Science, Technology And Research Transit Access Point) interconnection exchange. This connection enables the universities and research community of Hong Kong to tap the vast resources of Internet2. It also facilitates research collaborations that demand high-speed and high-bandwidth Internet connectivity. Revolutionary applications including virtual classrooms and laboratories, large-scale genetic databases and applications, atmospheric research, digital libraries, multi-point videoconferencing and video broadcast, distributed computation, Grid Computing are researched upon and deployed on the HARNET-Interent2 connection. The HARNET-Internet2 network link was set up with sole sponsorship from PCCW for the local data network service and the donation of a central router from Cisco Systems (HK) Limited.

Future Development

JUCC has a firm commitment in providing information technology support to education and in continuously developing and upgrading HARNET with state-of-the-art technology to enhance the network performance. Development plans include further developingthe optical network infrastructure to create an advanced and high-speed networking environment for the tertiary institutions in Hong Kong and establishing the network connection to china and overseas advanced education and research networks.

In support of our academia and researchers in Hong Kong to leverage their collaborations and exchanges with other researchers in the world and to boost our leadership role internationally, JUCC will continue to work with the vision to develop Hong Kong into an Internet hub to support research in the Southeast Asia Region and to develop a Hong Kong education network to support Hong Kong's aspiration to becoming a major education hub in the region.

Maintained by Computer Centre, The University of Hong Kong. Last updated on 18 July 2008.

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