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2008 Technology Update Schedule
A schedule of known infrastructure changes is cataloged here for use by information technology consultants on campus.
On the Horizon...
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| August 2008 | ||
| July 2008 | ||
| June 2008 | ||
| May 2008 | ||
| April 2008 | ||
| March 2008 | ||
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| February 2008 | ||
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| January 2008 | ||
Details
August 2008: Interruption to central computing
services August 23, 7 a.m. to 3 p.m.
An electrical power outage is required at one of the University data centers
to carry out service upgrades. This work will improve reliability and increase
capacity for central computing services. OIT has worked to find a time that
will cause as little disruption as possible. The work has been scheduled
for Saturday, August 23, from 7 a.m. until 3 p.m. The following services
will not be available during the outage:
- Student e-mail on IMAP1/mailserver3
- Digital Student Suitcase (service will be up, but no requests will work)
- Almagest
File shares:
- SWS file share
- SCAD file share
- The Art Museum's /PUAM file share
- Streaming for the Language Resource Center, WWS, Library Reserves
- Webtrend logs
- oraback for Oracle logs
- Athletics Audio
The campus community should expect that most other central computing services will be available during this period, but you should check the OIT Outage announcement regarding this outage for details. The OIT Help Desk will be open throughout the outage to answer any questions you may have. The OIT website at www.princeton.edu/oit will also be updated with any information as necessary. OIT regrets the inconvenience this outage will cause and thanks you for your patience.
August 2008: PuTTY now recommended as the University's
default SSH client
The University's recommended SSH client has changed to a collection of Open
Source SSH clients called PuTTY. The software is freely licensed for download
from http://www.putty.org under the MIT
License. Distribution to University departmental DeSC computers will be announced
at a later date. The PuTTY clients are simple to install and very stable.
PuTTY is popular in the Linux community, which is likely to be the largest
group of users on campus. For those who want a secure graphical FTP interface,
OIT also recommends the use of FileZilla, a free FTP solution found at
http://filezilla-project.org.
Information about SSH at Princeton University can be found at:
www.princeton.edu/ssh. If you
have any questions, please contact the OIT Help Desk at 8-4357 or
helpdesk@princeton.edu.
August 2008: Managed Macintosh Environment (MME) available
on Wednesday, August 13
OIT has been working to put more options in place for departmental Macintosh
users. If there are Intel Macintosh users in your department who would like
to take advantage of a centrally managed computing environment -- similar
to that of DeSC for Windows computers -- the information below will be of
interest. The Managed Macintosh Environment (MME) went into production Wednesday,
August 13, 2008. Though MME has many of the same policies as DeSC (for example,
no administrative access, centralized software distribution, etc.), not all
University business applications are certified to be compatible in this
environment. Please go to the MME website at
http://department.princeton.edu/its/managed_environments/mme
for more detailed information including business application incompatibilities,
computer setup instructions, and how to schedule OIT assistance. Please contact
picss@princeton.edu or 8-6034 if you have any questions.
August 2008: PeopleSoft 9 outage and upgrade beginning August
1
An important upgrade to PeopleSoft Human Resources and Student Administration
will go live on Tuesday, August 5. This upgrade to PeopleSoft 9 brings a
new look, new features, and ease of use for students, faculty and staff.
Note that PeopleSoft University Financials will not be affected by this upgrade.
In order to bring the new version live it will be necessary for PeopleSoft
Human Resources and Student Administration to be unavailable from Friday,
August 1st, until Tuesday, August 5th. Members of the University community
have been reading about the changes during the spring semester, and many
have already taken advantage of the valuable training offered by OIT. For
information about continuing training opportunities and further details about
new features, see
www.princeton.edu/pshelp, in
particular the "What's New in Version 9" link. Questions can be directed
to the OIT Help Desk at 8-HELP(4357) option #3.
July 2008: Windows XP Service XP 3 to be distributed to
University computers
On Tuesday, August 5, 2008, at 12:01 a.m., the Microsoft Windows Software
Support Server (WSUS) will distribute software to install the Microsoft Windows
XP Service Pack 3 (SP3) to all University Windows XP computers (excluding
undergraduate student machines). All DeSC computers were upgraded to XP SP3
on Monday, July 14, and those computer users may ignore this message. This
distribution is necessary to increase Microsoft Windows XP operating system
security. The download and installation of this service pack is reported
to be relatively transparent to end users. For more information regarding
Windows XP SP3, please see: the
Microsoft
online announcement. If you feel it necessary, please communicate
this information to your departmental users and remind them to log off but
not power off at the end of each day. This best practice will ensure that
their workstations receive security updates and software distributions and
their files can be backed up.
July 2008: Interruption to central computing services
July 19, 6 a.m. to noon
An electrical power outage is required at one of the University data centers
to install new electrical equipment. This work will improve reliability and
increase the capacity of the electrical infrastructure for central computing
services. OIT and the Facilities department have worked to find a time that
will cause as little disruption as possible. The work has been scheduled
for Saturday, July 19, from 6 a.m. until noon. The following services will
not be available during the outage:
- Student e-mail on IMAP1/mailserver3
- Public servers: phoenix and fedora (though the other hats and arizonas will be available)
- PeopleSoft Report Repository for HR/SA and the messaging connection between CRM (HR Helpdesk and PS)
- Digital student suitcase (service will be up, but no requests will work)
- Almagest
File shares:
- SWS file share
- SCAD file share
- The Art Museum's /PUAM file share
- " Streaming for the Language Resource Center, WWS, library Reserves
- Webtrend logs
- oraback for Oracle logs
- Athletics Audio
Additionally, any services which use ldap.princeton.edu for authentication will experience timeouts or slowness, including Blackboard, many websites, PeopleSoft, and anything that requires authentication using your LDAP password. The campus community should expect that most other central computing services will be available during this period, but you should check the OIT Outage announcement regarding this outage for details. The OIT Help Desk will be open throughout the outage to answer any questions you may have. The OIT website at www.princeton.edu/oit will also be updated with any information as necessary during this outage.
May 2008: Digital Student Suitcase available for graduating
students pack their files and e-mail
A suite of tools is available to help graduating students pack their IT property
(such as e-mail messages, H: drive files, and Blog entries) and remove their
computers from the Princeton domain. For details, see
www.princeton.edu/suitcase.
May 2008: OIT central file server quota now
1GB
OIT is pleased to announce that all faculty, staff, and student central file
server (H: drive) quota has increased to 1GB as of May 5, 2008. This quota
upgrade quadruples the storage space available for your files. If you have
been paying for additional H: drive quota and you need no more than 1GB,
you will no longer be billed. Combined with a similar e-mail quota upgrade
in February, this increase should significantly expand access to fully backed-up
central storage for your messages and documents. Departmental quota has also
increased to 20GB. Please see
kb.princeton.edu/4926 for details
of quota allocations.
May 2008: PeopleSoft Human Resources and Student
Records Upgrade
PeopleSoft Human Resources and Student Records applications will have a new
look, new features, and improved ease of use, following a year-long 2007-08
upgrade project. These changes, effective August 2008, will affect: all employees
who use Human Resources Self Service to enroll in benefits, change personal
information, and update emergency contacts. Also affected will be faculty
and administrative users of Campus Community, Human Resources, Benefits,
and Payroll Systems, Course Information System, Graduate and Undergraduate
Admissions, and Student Records. Please note that University Financials will
not be affected. More information will be sent to specific affected groups
later in the spring. Information sessions, online demos, and hands-on training
will be scheduled in late spring and summer. Keep an eye on your inbox for
additional details. If you would like to take an early look at some of the
new features, you may also visit
www.princeton.edu/pshelp.
April 2008: OIT Security Check-Up Service: Make sure
your departmental information is secure
OIT is offering a new service to help departments ensure that sensitive data
they may have on local systems is protected. Offered at no charge to both
academic and administrative departments, the OIT Security Check-up Service
includes a review of all aspects of protecting sensitive data. (The University
defines nine pieces of information as sensitive. See the
University's Information
Security Policy for more information about confidential information.
Departments may have additional information that they may need to keep
confidential.) OIT and representatives of the department will meet to map
out the details of the review. The work is typically a team effort between
OIT staff, departmental IT staff, and departmental data stewards. Once the
review is complete, the team will provide a report on the overall system
and data security and appropriate recommendations. Contact the University's
IT Security Officer, Anthony Scaturro, at 8-4611 or scaturro@princeton.edu,
with any questions -- and to schedule an OIT Security Check-up for your
department!
March 2008: OIT dotNet service launches
This small-scale, shared, development environment enables departments to
build web applications that interact with Microsoft SQLServer databases and/or
Microsoft Access databases. It uses Microsoft's Internet Information Services
(IIS) web server, which supports application development environments and
languages that use Microsoft's .NET technological foundation, such as Visual
Studio, Microsoft SharePoint Designer, and CodeCharge. For more information,
please see: kb.princeton.edu/9900.
February 2008: OIT offering departmental on-site training
for Microsoft Vista and Office 2007
Is your department planning to migrate to Windows Vista and Microsoft Office
2007 in the near future? Did you know that OIT offers on-site training for
your group to help them make the transition more smoothly? OIT offers the
following migration classes on-site at your department. For more information,
send e-mail to
training@princeton.edu.
January 2008: Vista and Leopard operating system upgrade
clinic for SCI computer users
OIT is hosting a series of clinics to assist currently enrolled students
upgrade the operating systems of their 2006-07 and 2007-08 SCI computers
to Windows Vista Ultimate and/or OS X 10.5 (Leopard). The clinics are being
held at the OIT Solutions Center and begin January 28, 2008 and continue
into February. Five weekdays, one weekday evening, and two Saturdays are
scheduled. To participate, register for the clinic and reserve a time slot
online at:
https://oitscs.princeton.edu/unstuc
Vista Ultimate and OS X 10.5 (Leopard) media will be available at the clinic at an educational discount price. For computers that require additional RAM, memory will be installed as part of the upgrade. There will be a charge for the cost of the memory, but no charge for the installation. Details, including clinic dates, system requirements, and charges are provided at this site. Be sure to read everything carefully and feel free to call the OIT Help Desk at 258-4357 (HELP) with any questions.
January 2008: MyFax now offered for sending and receiving
faxes from your computer
MyFax is a convenient Internet service that lets you send and receive faxes
through your e-mail, and replaces the OIT Campus Fax Gateway as the recommended
and supported process for faxing from your computer. MyFax requires no specific
hardware or software; all you need is Internet access, an e-mail address,
and a MyFax account. On Thursday, January 31, 2008, the OIT Campus Fax Gateway
service will be discontinued.
The University has created a corporate account with MyFax for faculty and staff so that billing can be centrally managed. University sponsored MyFax accounts are only available to faculty/staff with a valid departmental project grant. For an overview of the service and a link to the MyFax account request form, please see: www.princeton.edu/fax. MyFax is also available to students through a personal account if a personal credit card is used. See the www.myfax.com web site for more information.
January 2008: DeSC Windows migration to Vista swings into
high gear
The next phase of the DeSC Windows Vista Migration project swings into high
gear. The Desktop Systems Council requests that departments upgrade or replace
all computers over the next eighteen (18) months with the DeSC Windows Vista
image. To assist departments, OIT has enhanced existing services including
computer setup for migration, Vista and Office 2007 training classes, and
others services as needed for the duration of this project. For more information,
see: www.princeton.edu/desc
Archived technology updates are also cataloged, beginning June, 2003.
- Archived technology updates for 2007
- Archived technology updates for 2006
- Archived technology updates for 2005
- Archived technology updates for 2004
- Archived technology updates for 2003
- E-mail tech-updates@princeton.edu to have a change included in this list.
Last Updated:Monday August 18 2008