TerpConnect File Sharing Service

  1. Overview
  2. Service Benefits
  3. Service Description
  4. Service Pricing
  5. Customer Requirements

Overview

The Division of Information Technology (DIT) offers a fee-based, TerpConnect File Sharing Service that allows individuals, groups, departments, or entire colleges to increase available disk space within the TerpConnect computing environment. By default, TerpConnect offers five gigabytes (GB) of home space storage at no charge to all faculty, staff, and students. If the standard allocation is not enough, the TerpConnect File Sharing Service provides the ability to add more storage as needed.

The underlying file sharing technology used by TerpConnect is AFS, a distributed file system developed at Carnegie Mellon University and known for its robust, scalable, and secure architecture. The AFS environment (and by extensio n, the TerpConnect environment as well) is accessible using client software available for Microsoft Windows, OS X, Linux, and Solaris. It can also be accessed using WebDAV or through a web browser (e.g., Firefox, Internet Explorer, or Safari).

Service Benefits

There are many reasons why individuals or departments might wish to choose DIT's TerpConnect File Sharing Service. Benefits include:

  • Reduced cost (no need to purchase a server or to allocate resources to provide system administration or account maintenance)
  • Robustness (data resides on a top-of-the line, fault-tolerant storage array)
  • Security (authentication and authorization uses University Directory credentials)
  • Sustainability (decreased use of campus computing resources)
  • Flexibility of access:
    • Connect from Windows, OS X, Linux, and Solaris environments.
    • Connect from on- or off-campus using HTTPS, WebDAV, SSH, or SFTP
    • Access data by individual or group
  • Offsite backups (additional fee required)
  • Peace of mind (24x7 system monitoring and support

Service Description

The Terpconnect File Sharing Service provides individuals, groups, and departments the flexibility to administer network-accessible disk space as best suits their needs. The following table lists common tasks performed by customers and DIT administrators:

FunctionCustomerDIT
Create initial storage partition X
Increase storage allocation (partition size) X
Create/rename/delete AFS volumesX 
Manage AFS volume quotasX 
Restore deleted filesXX1
Modify directory access control listsX 
Manage groups (create/rename/delete)X 
Manage group membership (add/remove)X 

1: Customers can restore from the previous night's on-disk backup. DIT will be needed to restore older data (from tape).

Service Pricing

The charge for DIT's TerpConnect File Sharing Service is comprised of two components:

  • storage $.16 per GB per month. Storage is available in 50GB allocations.
  • infrastructure & administration $1,000 annually or $100 per month, whichever is less.

OIT will invoice customers annually. The billing period begins with the first full month of service and ends on June 30. Below are several possible pricing scenarios:

Sample Pricing for Various Configurations (Annualized)
Storage Allocation1 Disk Costs Support Costs2 Total Cost
50 GB$96.00$1000.00 $1096.00
100 GB$192.00$1000.00 $1192.00
250 GB$480.00$1000.00 $1480.00
500 GB$960.00$1000.00 $1960.00
750 GB$1440.00$1000.00 $2440.00
1000 GB$1920.00$1000.00 $2440.00

1: Additional configurations may be purchased as needed in 50 GB blocks.
2: For contracts lasting less than 10 months, the charge is $100/month.

DIT provides a separately chargeable backup service, which includes off-site storage of tapes. Although not required, this service is strongly recommended. Additional information including cost is available at http://www.backups.umd.edu. Customers who purchase the backup service will receive a monthly invoice that reflects usage charges. The total amount of the bill will vary depending on the amount of data backed up during a given month.

Customer Requirements

In order for a computer/laptop/etc to access the data stored with the TerpConnect File Sharing Service, it must use one of the following mechanisms:

  • AFS client software to mount the space natively. TerpConnect/Glue systems already have this installed. Windows, Mac, and Linux and Unix-like systems can download the software at no charge from the OpenAFS website.
  • WebDAV client software, which also will mount the space natively. WebDAV clients are built into most recent Windows and Mac OSes. Linux users may need to install one (see for installation and configuration instructions.
  • Secure FTP or Secure Copy commands: these will not allow for native access, but provide a simple application which can be used to move files to and from the TerpConnect filesystem and your local drive. These tools are typically installed by default on most Linux and Unix systems. Windows and Mac users might need to install client applications for this.
  • DIT maintains a web based file manager which can be configured to access your TerpConnect space. This only requires a web browser on the client system. Again, this is not native access, but allows one to move files to and from the TerpConnect system via a web based application. For more information on the use of the file manager.

Additional information on these various forms of access data on TerpConnect file systems can be found here; that page is specifically for accessing GRACE files, but other than the paths the information would apply here as well.