This document is a guide to IT-related services that may be of use to researchers in the College of Arts and Sciences (ASC). At an institution as large as Ohio State, there are many resource providers, although usually ASCTech, the college’s IT group, is a good first step. In particular, we work closely with the university IT group, the Office of Technology and Digital Information (OTDI). Since this document is written by ASCTech, it’s naturally heavy on our services, although we make every effort to include services from other providers. A list of the most common non-ASCTech service providers is at the end of this document.
In general, the starting point for IT-related research questions in ASCTech is the Research Computing Facilitation (RCF) group.
Research IT Services
Data policies
This is not a service but since it affects how we handle research data at Ohio State, it’s worth considering the impact of some non-technical “rules” on data related services.
The university classifies all institutional data, which includes research data, as Public (which we call S1), Internal (S2), Private (S3) or Restricted (S4). The university requires the protection of all institutional data with security and privacy controls appropriate to the classification of the data. In Arts and Sciences, most of our research data are classified as S2. We may also have Research Health Information (distinct from Protected Health Information, defined by HIPAA), which is S4. In rare instances (although more likely since NIH has designated some of their controlled-access repositories as Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI)), college researchers may have more highly restricted S4 data that require further controls.
There is also a University Research Data policy. Among other things, this requires the retention of primary research data for five years after the closeout of a research project and five years after a PI leaves the university.
Data storage
ASCTech offers network research storage at a highly subsidized price ($20/TB per year, longer terms encouraged). It can be mounted as a drive on Windows, Mac and Linux computers. The service includes 30 days of off-site snapshots. It is suitable for all data classifications except more highly restricted S4 data (CUI, export controlled, ITAR, etc.).
The university provides Microsoft OneDrive and Teams. Please note that the current storage limits are under review, although the announced reductions in storage limits are paused; see the Storage and Email Transformation Project page for the most up-to-date information. Each faculty, staff and student gets an individual OneDrive account (currently we get 5 TB storage; a reduction to 500 GB is proposed) this is intended as personal storage and for sharing small amounts of data with a small number of collaborators for a short period of time. A faculty or staff member can create one or more Teams; each Team currently provides 25 TB of storage (proposed reduction to 5 TB) and is intended for long-term collaboration with larger groups.
When sharing information within a research group using one of these tools, remember that a OneDrive account goes away when the owner leaves the university while a Team with multiple owners does not. We have a knowledge base article that is a good guide to using OneDrive and Teams, and the university provides very comprehensive information. Note that the university excludes “research data that requires large-volume storage and requires long-term retention” from Teams and OneDrive acceptable use cases.
Many of the software tools available to us, such as Mathematica and Overleaf, include a modest amount of storage; since this is typically a small amount of space intended for use with the particular tool, any description is left to the appropriate section below.
OTDI maintains an interactive storage finder assistant that helps identify appropriate storage resources based on selection criteria.
Data movement
Globus is a service that allows you to efficiently, securely and reliably move large amounts of data. It is widely available at supercomputer centers and national labs, yet can directly transfer data to or from your laptop. Arts and Sciences has a data transfer node (DTN) connected to our research storage (above) allowing very fast data transfers with off-campus sources (for example, we have moved 1 TB of data to OSC and to Argonne National Lab in about 15 minutes).
There is also a Globus connector to Microsoft OneDrive and Teams. See our knowledge base article on setting up and using Globus and our walk-through video and slide deck.
Data management
ASCTech’s Research Computing Facilitation group offers a variety of data management services, including identifying storage options, supporting data use agreements, and advising on experimental design .
University Libraries has Research Commons, which offers numerous research-related services, including those of their research data, digital humanities, and GIS librarians. See also Research Commons’ guides to research data and data management best practices.
Data repositories
University Libraries maintain a Knowledge Bank; its mission is to “collect, preserve and distribute digitally formatted intellectual output of Ohio State faculty, staff and students, that is currently or will be of research interest.” It tends to be mostly written material, perhaps with a small amount of supporting data.
Through the University Libraries, OSU has institutional memberships with Dryad and the Qualitative Data Repository.
CHRR (formerly the Center for Human Resource Research) offers a data repository for sensitive information. This can help researchers meet federal standards for public access to data while keeping the data secure.
Data enclaves
CHRR offers a data enclave service that allows remote access to computation on sensitive data.
ASCTech can work with you to design a physical or virtual compute and storage environment that meets requirements of funding agencies, data use agreements, etc.
Web sites
The university provides a limited WordPress instance, u.osu.edu.
ASCTech’s Web Services group can host web sites using a standard site template that is suitable for departments and research groups.
ASCTech also offers a simple web server service if you want to develop and maintain your own site. This works with our database server, above.
Application development
Our Application Development team can design and build custom research web applications.
Database server
ASCTech can provide MySQL and PostgreSQL databases; work with your support person to get a database set up.
ASCTech also hosts a Filemaker server which you can use with your Filemaker clients instead of maintaining your own server.
Similar or more sophisticated environments can be built on cloud platforms; see the section in this document for details on getting started with AWS, Azure or GCP.
Networking
Almost all space on campus is covered by wireless networking; for faculty, staff and students, authentication is through eduroam, which is seamlessly available on campuses throughout the world. Guest access and device authentication is also available.
Especially in data-intensive areas of campus, wired networking is also available. Devices on wired networks may be accessible from off campus through secure means such as gateways, jump hosts, and virtual private network (VPN) servers, or more conveniently, through the university’s Guacamole service. Check with your local support person.
Networking services are provided by OTDI; we can work with them to design atypical research networks. In particular, instrument computers with restrictions on operating system versions or patching can be attached to an exception network that allows access to specific resources while providing effective isolation from network threats.
High performance computing
Arts and Sciences maintains a high performance computing (HPC) cluster called Unity. Unity is freely available to any researcher in the college. There are over 60 public nodes that anyone can use; users can also buy their own compute nodes for their exclusive use. See our user documentation for more information.
The Ohio Supercomputer Center (OSC) provides several much larger clusters. Although there is a cost for using OSC resources, costs are very reasonable, each PI gets $1000 credit per year, and the college and some departments cover much of the cost over $1000.
OSC also hosts academic courses at no cost. Courses are often run with RStudio or Jupyter Notebook, which can include links into the Carmen course management system.
Windows computing
Occasionally a research group that uses primarily Mac or Linux computers needs to do something that requires Windows. ASCTech provides a Windows computer, accessible through Remote Desktop, that can address this need. Your local support team can help with this.
Cloud providers
The university has agreements with the big three cloud providers, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform (GCP). Using these services through OSU’s agreements allows direct billing to OSU funds, free consultations with technical staff, and some discounts.
Scientific computing support
Several groups on campus provide or sponsor scientific computing training or consultation. For example, the Statistics department provides a statistical consulting service and Research Commons hosts many training events.
ASCTech employs a research software engineer embedded in two departments, Astronomy and Physics. ASCTech is eager to work with departments to develop additional dedicated scientific computing specialists, including helping with specific training for local support technicians.
We have access to technical resources with some software and hardware vendors (for example, Wolfram (Mathematica) and LabVIEW, AWS, Azure and GCP, and Dell and Lenovo).
Electronic laboratory notebooks
The university has an enterprise license for LabArchives, an electronic laboratory notebook.
While often thought of as useful for only bench sciences, LabArchives has many features, such as virtually unlimited storage, easy collaboration, and Markdown text entry, that make it a convenient tool for any research or documentation purpose. All edits are recorded and timestamped, making it a valuable part of technology commercialization projects.
Document preparation
The university licenses Microsoft 365 (which includes, among other things, the traditional office tools such as Word, Excel and Powerpoint).
The university licenses Adobe Acrobat Pro for faculty and staff, and Adobe Express for faculty, staff and students.
You can purchase Adobe Creative Cloud and Overleaf through OTDI; find them on OTDI’s Site-Licensed Software page.
University Libraries has a guide to commonly used citation management software.
Code repository
The university hosts a GitLab instance at code.osu.edu.
Software
In addition to contracts with several more general software companies such as Microsoft and Adobe, Ohio State also has site-licensed research software such as ArcGIS, Mathematica, MATLAB and NVivo.
Other software, such as LabVIEW and ChemDraw, is available to ASC researchers since the college or departments have purchased licenses.
Some software, such as Graphpad Prism and BioRender, is available at a low cost through volume purchases by other groups on campus. Contact us for more information.
Other software, such as Stata, is usually purchased directly by individuals. Such purchases should be by requisition in Workday (as opposed to reimbursement of purchase using a personal credit card) and you should talk to ASCTech first—we need to provide a security review of all such software, and it’s easier and faster if you have that in hand when you start the purchase process.
Emerging Technology Studio
The Emerging Technology Studio (ETS) is an incubation space designed to empower researchers, faculty, and students with emerging technologies and provide a framework to engage in transdisciplinary thinking, creative problem solving and experiential learning.
Artificial intelligence
Applications of artificial intelligence (AI) increase daily; the fields within AI vary greatly. The university is concerned about the inclusion of institutional data in generative AI (GenAI) applications, and maintains a list of approved tools in more academic or administrative environments. By their very nature, research applications of AI can involve novel tools and techniques, and there are many examples of successful programs at Ohio State. As much as we can within the bounds of assuming reasonable risks, in ASCTech we try to facilitate research involving AI.
The ETS group coordinates GenAI research applications within the college. In particular, they can provide easy access to all the approved models in a very cost-effective way; this avoids the hurdles involved with attempting to work with ChatGPT or DeepSeek directly.
The RCF group can help identify resources for more traditional AI applications such as machine learning and deep learning, especially on Unity (the college HPC cluster) and OSC.
Digital accessibility
We are obligated to comply with Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). This requires that all of the university’s digital content (web sites and mobile apps) must be accessible. Contact ASCTech’s Digital Accessibility group for more information.
Computer purchases
For computers for routine use (laptops or desktops used for email, web browsing, office work, etc.), we suggest purchasing one of our standard configurations. These are Lenovo computers (running Windows) or Macs.
If you have special requirements, we can work with you to purchase a non-standard system; all purchases from vendors other than Apple, Dell or Lenovo require senior director approval.
Some research is facilitated by using specialized workstations; we can help build appropriate configurations and get quotes from vendors.
As mentioned in the HPC section above, Unity users can purchase compute nodes for their exclusive use. Often users have specific needs, such as multiple GPUs, that may not be available elsewhere. This allows researchers not only to avoid system maintenance tasks but also use the public compute resources in their work. Occasionally, we’re able to “piggy-back” on other entities’ large compute node purchases and get better pricing. We announce these opportunities as far in advance as we can.
All computer and tablet purchases must be initiated by ASCTech (we approve all IT-related purchases in Workday; it’s more efficient if we also initiate the purchase). Work with your local support person or submit a ticket.
Links to Other Providers
These are common providers of research services outside of ASCTech, with some of their most common services.