This is a Service Level Agreement ("SLA") between the campus community and ICIT to document:
The Enterprise PHP Hosting service enables the operation of light-weight PHP applications on the UW-Whitewater campus website. ICIT provides and maintains the hosting system, which consists of both development and production environments supporting PHP and MySQL technologies. Campus academic or business units may request folders and databases within the development environment and may develop applications on this system in accordance with the terms of this agreement. Upon request, the ICIT Web Team will promote applications from development to production. Ownership of and responsibility for the maintenance and support of these applications remains with the sponsoring unit.
Limitations
The Enterprise Web Systems for UW-Whitewater include limited support of PHP technologies to address special case needs which are not met by other campus IT services. The Enterprise PHP Hosting service provides a dedicated environment for stand-alone PHP applications associated with the campus website that require database connectivity, perform file processing, or contain complex logic. Applications with critical or campus-wide impacts, which require integration with other systems of data such as student records, or which require extensions or modifications to the PHP environment are generally not appropriate for this environment. Exceptions may be requested as defined in this document; however, most projects with these types of needs will require project request submission and prioritization though the IT Governance process.
As this environment is integrated with the campus website, all applications must comply with all campus website requirements for style, content and accessibility. It is the responsibility of the application owner to know these requirements and to ensure compliance.
The lead developer of any application must be a professional employee of the sponsoring unit. This service is not available for student academic projects and should not be used to host applications developed by students, with the exception of student employees who received direct and active supervision by the designated lead developer.
PHP Hosting Account Requests
PHP Hosting Accounts are shared at the level of academic department or business unit. A new PHP Hosting Account request must come from a Dean, from an academic unit or a department director for a non-academic unit, and it must identify a primary PHP Hosting Account Owner. The individual must be a professional employee of the requesting unit. Requests will be reviewed by ICIT staff and require approval by the CIO or designee.
PHP Hosting Accounts
Upon approval, the ICIT Web Team will establish a PHP Hosting Account for the requesting academic department or business unit. Only one such account can be created for any department or unit. This account associates a root folder in the development environment, a group of one or more User Accounts, and one or more MySQL databases instances on the development environment.
PHP Hosting Account Owners
Upon creation of a PHP Hosting Account, the PHP Hosting Account Owner (Owner) will be provided a User Account with access to the root folder associated with the PHP Hosting Account.
The owner (and only the Owner) may request the following from ICIT Web Team:
The owner holds primary responsibility for the following, with respect to all users, applications, and database associated with the PHP Hosting Account:
User Accounts
Access to the development environment is granted via named User Accounts, which are created by the ICIT Web Team upon request from the Owner. Account information should not be shared with other users. All User Accounts associated with PHP Hosting Account share the same access to the files and databases associated with that account. User Accounts are not integrated with the NetID authentication system, may be assigned user names that do not match NetIDs, and, for security reasons, should not be assigned the same passwords as are used in conjunction with the users' NetIDs to log in to other campus systems.
PHP Hosting Account Folders
Each PHP Hosting Account will be associated with a root folder named for the department or unit. Applications should be established in subfolders immediately under this root folder. Only one application should be created within a subfolder.
The file system of the development environment can be accessed via SSH and SFTP using any standards compliant client. Unsecured FTP access is not supported by this service.
Production database instances will use different access information and may be named differently than development databases. Upon request by the PHP Hosting Account Owner, the ICIT Web Team will provide the associated User Accounts with access to query and modify data on the production instance of a database. Changes to database structures on the production environment will only be possible though the migration process.
Migration to Production Environment
The production environment will contain an account root folder with the same name as the root folder in the development environment. Migration to production will be completed by copying the entire contents of a subfolder from the development root folder to the production root folder. No files will be migrated to or created in an account's root folder on the production environment.
Migration requests must specify the location of all database connection information in the application. This will be updated by the ICIT Web Team to connect the application to the production database instance. Production applications should not access development databases.
Production database instances can be created or modified by replication of the development instance to the production environment or by execution of a creation or modification script. The ICIT Web Team will execute the migration using the method and directions specified in the migration request.
Migration Requests must specify:
Appropriate Use
The development environment should only be used for application development and testing and can only be accessed on campus via VPN. Links to the development environment should never be published on websites and should be shared with others for testing or evaluation purposes.
Resource Sharing and Noninterference with Other Applications
The hosting environments are shared by numerous applications and system resources are shared among these applications. All applications must be designed to use these shared resources efficiently and to prevent negative impacts on other applications. This service may not be appropriate for some applications with very large resource requirements.
Any application that creates stability issues for other applications of the hosting environment may be shut down at ICIT's discretion. If this occurs, an immediate notification will be sent to the PHP Hosting Account Owner describing the problem, actions taken, and reasons for these actions.
Inactivity
The ICIT Web Team reserves the right to archive or remove development folders, databases, and accounts that have not been accessed for six months and are not associated with applications running in production.
File and Database Backup and Recovery
The files and MySQL databases on the hosting environments are backed up on a daily basis, and this daily backup information is retained for approximately five weeks on tape. Weekly backups are transported out of the data center to a different building on campus, and once per semester a backup set is taken off campus. The method of database backup requires restoration of an entire database; restoration of individual rows in an existing database is not supported. File and database restoration requests are usually processed in one to three business days.
All hosting service requests should be directed to the ICIT Web Team, via the webmaster@uww.edu account; however, ICIT supports only the environment and developer access to that environment. Requests for support from users of the applications running on this environment should be directed to the PHP Hosting Account Owner.
In Scope Services
Out of Scope Services
Requesting Exceptions to Service Limitations
Exceptions to service limitations (e.g. server configuration changes, installation of PHP modules, or access to external data) may be granted in rare cases. ICIT has the sole right to approve or deny exceptions. Requests will be evaluated on the following and other pertinent factors:
Time pressure due to insufficient research or lack of advanced planning will not be accepted as justification for granting an exception.
Service Request Response Time
Service requests will be handled as soon as possible without preempting campus projects or scheduled work. Response times may be longer if necessary personnel are unavailable of out of the office.
Service Request | Response Time |
---|---|
Creation of a new PHP Hosting Account | Evaluation of the request will be initiated within five business days. Decision time will depend on the availability of additional information as required. Accoutn will be created within two days of completion of the request evaluation. |
Creation of User Accounts | One to three business days |
Creation of MySQL database instances | One to three business days |
Basic migration of files or databases | One to two business days if migration can occur during business hours. A minimum of five days in advance notice is requested for early morning migration. |
Migration of files requiring additional testing, configuration or other tasks | Up to five business days if migration can occur during business hours. A minimum of five days advance notice is requested for early morning migration. |
Request for an exception to defined service limitations | Evaluation of the request will be initiated within five business days. Implementation, if approved, will depend on the availability of senior staff resources for research, configuration, testing and deployment. |
Incident Response Time Applications with the potential to result in a significant campus-wide impact should not be hosted using Enterprise PHP Hosting service; thus Impact Level 1 is not applicable.
Impact Level | Explanation | Examples | Initial Response Time |
---|---|---|---|
Impact Level 1 | Campus-wide impact | Not applicable for Enterprise PHP Hosting | |
Impact Level 2 | Limited number of users or groups are impacted | The production PHP environment stops responding to page requests | The ICIT Web Team will assess the situation and inform the PHP Hosting Account Owners within one business day |
Impact Level 3 | Individuals are affected | An application developer cannot access the development environment | The ICIT Web Team will assess service availability and respond within three business days |
Informational Request | Individuals need information on how to host Enterprise PHP applications | A staff member is considering developing a PHP application | ICIT Web Team will respond within five days |
Service Requests
All requests for new service of reports of service issues will be handled by the ICIT Web Team during university business hours. Requests should be submitted via email to webmaster@uww.edu.
Incident Reports
Incidents with an Impact Level 2 or higher should be reported to the ICIT Helpdesk via, helpdesk@uww.edu, or 262-472-4357. Other incidents may be reported to the ICIT Helpdesk or directly to the Web Team via webmaster@uww.edu
No fees are associated with this service.
History:
Approved by Middle Tier, Executive Tier governance July 2011
Approved by Chancellor, August 19
Posted: September 12, 2011
Service level agreements (SLA's) allow Instructional, Communication and Information Technology to offer colleges, departments and university organizations IT services on an enterprise level.