History of the CEC
The construction of Fisher Hall and its computer facility was completed in 1964. The Seeber Computation Laboratory, established in 1958 through the foresight and encouragement of Dr. Rex Seeber (1879-1957), was moved to this new facility. There was much discussion at the time as to the direction of computing at MTU. Digital versus analog computing was the issue of the time. Partially due to this issue the facility was split into two separate units and the name was changed. There was the Digital Computer Laboratory under the direction of Dr. G. Cleaves Byers, Head of the Department of Mathematical and Computer Sciences and the Analog Computer Laboratory under the direction of Dr. K. M. McMillin. Because the directorship of the Digital Computer Laboratory monopolized a good portion of Dr. Byers time and efforts, Scott Johnson was appointed a full time position as the new director in 1967. At that time the name was changed to Michigan Tech Computer Center and along with the Analog Computer Laboratory, later to be known as the Simulation Laboratory, served the academic needs of the entire university. In October 1967 the first Computer Center Newsletter was written. The computer at that time was the IBM-1620. A new IBM-1311 disk drive was added that summer allowing the use of the MONITOR-I operating system.
In 1976 the Computer Center, later known as Academic Computer Services, was moved to the newly completed EERC building. The Simulation Laboratory was expanded to accommodate a newly acquired hybrid computer known as the EAI (Electronic Associates, Inc.) model 8800 Scientific Computing System. As the term hybrid implies, this was a system consisting of a digital computer and an analog computer along with sixteen channels of digital to analog and analog to digital conversion. Systems like this provided the best way to do simulations in real time. The cost of memory was too great to make it economically feasible to store the needed data points to perform a simulation in real time (8KB of memory then cost about $27,000.00). During the next decade much use was made of the hybrid computer. Many projects were performed for the military and other research funding units. Some projects were simulations and testing of the hydroneumatic suspension system of the M113A1 tank, stress analysis of helicopter blades and rotor, St Lawrence Seaway and many more. Math and Computer Science classes and labs were taught by Dr. McMillin utilizing this hybrid computer during this era.
In 1984 Dr. McMillin retired and the Dean of the College of Sciences and Arts decided to reorganize the Simulation Laboratory by folding it into Academic Computer Services (ACS). The name was changed to Engineering Computer Services and one year later was again changed to ACS-Fisher. This reorganization did not work well and was destined to change. In May of 1986 another reorganization took place. ACS-Fisher was returned to the College of Sciences and Arts and the name was changed to Center for Experimental Computation (CEC). The Center for Experimental Computation (CEC) was established and directed by Dr. A. Barry Kunz to coordinate efforts in high-speed modern scientific computation. Within the first year a rotating directorship was set up and the new director was Dr. Darrell Hicks from the Math department. The next director was Dr. Donald Beck from the Physics department followed by Dr. David Poplawski from the Computer Science department. The CEC provided computing services of a diverse nature. Everything from hypercubes to PCs to mini-mainframes are supported by the CEC and complete data acquisition systems were designed and built in the CEC for various research projects. Due to the explosion of distributed computing vs. centralized computing systems from 1988 to the present, and the required resources needed to support those systems, a CEC reorganization took place in the summer of 1993.
The CEC today
Today the CEC continues to provide computer services, hardware, software, and networking, to the departments of Mathematical Sciences, Computer Sciences, and Physics. Also the CEC is providing support for Biological Sciences and Social Sciences for an interim period during which these departments will become increasingly self reliant for computer support. The staff of the CEC include Jim Hoel (Director and Systems Engineer), Sakke Karstu (Senior Systems Programmer), Pat Krogel (Systems Administrator), Rich McKay(Systems Administrator), Chris Linn (Systems Administrator), Darla Kuras (User Consultant-software), and Prem Anand Rao (User Consultant). The staff of the CEC assists the various departments by evaluating, purchasing, and installing computer systems and software packages. User services such as backups and restores along with general computer and network maintenance are also provided. Additionally, the staff presents user workshops on items of common interest upon request. The CEC, located in Fisher Hall room 201, serves over 1000 faculty, staff, graduate and undergraduate students who use over 280 workstations, PCs, and mini-mainframes.