Susan M. Groppi '98 was in for a surprise when she logged into her e-mail account last month.

She had six new messages, but they had each been sent more than two weeks earlier.

"I received approximately six e-mails that had been delayed several weeks in delivery, including one announcement of a surprise birthday party for a close friend," Groppi says.

About 50 students had similar problems, receiving e-mail messages through the Faculty of Arts and Sciences' (FAS) mail server several weeks after they were initially sent.

The College's e-mail system has been less than stellar this semester, with students and faculty complaining about numerous system failures and a waiting time that sometimes exceeded 25 minutes to log in.

Professor of Classics and History Christopher P. Jones took the FAS to task at last month's Faculty meeting.

"Many of us who use e-mail regularly...know that the situation is not well. I would like to know...what amelioration we can hope for," Jones said.

Three hours later when Jones tried to e-mail his comments to The Crimson, the system wouldn't work.

He telephoned instead.

"It does seem to me that the Harvard people should be able to get their act together," he said in the interview.

The people responsible for providing the College with e-mail, Internet and other network services are the Harvard Arts and Sciences Computer Services (HASCS)--the support arm of the FAS.

HASCS employees have worked hard to fix the problems. So hard, in fact, that they often have little time to do anything else.

A two-month Crimson investigation, including interviews with about 100 faculty and staff, found that HASCS's focus on simply keeping the system operating has prevented it from creating and implementing a larger vision for information technology in the College.

Unprecedented Usage

At the heart of HASCS's problems is the increasing demand being placed on the system every day.