The days of SquirrelMail are coming to an end this year when Luther makes a few significant changes to its technology systems.

Library and Information Services is set to make a shift from using SquirrelMail to a Luther-branded Gmail with useful new integrated applications. They are also looking to increase bandwidth next year, making the Internet faster all over campus. To support technology updates for the future, a yearly technology fee of $150 for all students will be implemented next year.

“This money will be directly targeted at improving academic technology, multimedia technology and equipment and bandwidth on campus,” said Chris Barth, executive director of LIS.

Even after boosting bandwidth across campus from 25 megabits/second to 40 mb/s just last year, Barth feels technology can still be improved.

“One hundred fifty dollars per student multiplied by 2,500 students is $375,000,” said Shane Brown (‘08). “That’s a lot of money in one year.”

Barth said LIS plans to be transparent with the use of that money so students can see their money being put to good use.

There are still some complaints about low bandwidth on campus. Even with the recent increase, there remains a “Luther lag” at certain times during the day — mainly in the evening — when there is a greater load on the network.

“Internet is pretty slow on campus, but I feel like it was a lot worse a couple years ago,” said Brown. “It’s gotten better this year.”

However, students who are frustrated with slow Internet may be comparing Luther to other larger schools. In fact, according to Barth, Luther is No. 2 in the state of Iowa for bandwidth speed among private schools, including Grinnell, Loras, Coe, Wartburg, Cornell and Central Colleges.

“Looking at the data nationally, Luther is not out of line,” he said. “There are some schools that do have more, but our geography works against us. To get a fast Internet connection to Decorah is more expensive than other schools.”

Luther will save about $30,000 by running e-mail through Google.

“[Gmail] is free for us,” said Barth. “They do charge for commercial, but not for non-profits and educational institutions.”

Gmail will also offer Luther students a more complete and streamlined interface than SquirrelMail.

“Gmail will offer e-mail, an online word processor, spreadsheet application, chat and a calendar,” said Adam Forsyth, LIS senior systems administrator.

Forsyth also explained that a large portion of Luther students already forward their e-mail to another account, Gmail being the most popular, followed by Hotmail.

The plan to migrate from SquirrelMail to Gmail will occur in a step-by-step process starting this spring and reaching completion this fall.

“We will let people migrate at a time that is convenient for them, but eventually we’ll start to chase people off [SquirrelMail] and force them to migrate immediately,” Forsyth said. “Seniors will be forced this year ending with first-years next year. We’d like to have all students moved by the end of 2008. Then we’ll work to get faculty and administration after that, but we’ll let them move sooner if they wish.”

A benefit, particularly for seniors and future graduates, is that they will not have to switch e-mail accounts or set up forwarding after they graduate, as long as they stay with Gmail.

Anyone who is interested can take a peek at what this new service will look like by going to http://start.luther.edu.