DoIT News

Bb Maintenance to Fix Email Announcements: 11/20, 10 p.m. to 11/21, 1 a.m.

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 16:20:32 -0500

To address a recent issue with Blackboard announcements not being automatically sent by email when an instructor or manager selects that option, UMBC's Blackboard system will be down from 10 p.m., Friday, November 20, to 1 a.m., Saturday, November 21. Reminder: Why Blackboard needs scheduled maintenance.

Reminder: LDAP master downtime 11/14/09 10am-4pm

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 06:51:51 -0500

Just a reminder of the scheduled downtime this weekend... On Saturday 11/14/09 LDAP master will be down 10am-4pm to move to new server hardware. The following services will be unavailable during this time: - Calendar (for the first hour only) - Password changes via Webadmin - Email forward changes (Webadmin) - Changing of campus information (Webadmin)

Panasonic HVX200 P2 HD Camera Workshop

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:39:27 -0500

On December 9 the New Media Studio will host a presentation on the HVX200 camera by Panasonic rep Jim Jensen. Jim will go over in depth the extensive customizable features on the camera and answer any questions we may have. We will meet at 2pm in ECS 023. We are planning on taping the presentation for future reference. Please pass this on to others (including students) who may be interested. To reserve a seat in the workshop please visit http://www.umbc.edu/brownbag

Digital Storytelling Workshop for Faculty Jan. 20-22 2010

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:06:25 -0500

A three-day digital storytelling workshop for faculty will be held at UMBC on January 20, 21 and 22, 2010. Staff from the UMBC’s New Media Studio will conduct the workshop, during which participants will learn about the digital storytelling process while creating their own personal story.

Bringing together writing, photography and audio, the digital storytelling process facilitates the telling of personal and reflective stories in the form of digital movies. Through the process of producing their own digital stories over a three-day period, workshop participants gain insight into potential application of this approach in their own teaching. Here are samples from last summer’s workshop.

There are a limited number of seats available for faculty from other area institutions. The fee for non-UMBC faculty will be $500. If you are interested in reserving a seat please contact Bill Shewbridge at shewbrid@umbc.edu . Preference will be given to those who have not taken one of our workshops before, however alumni are welcome to join us if space is available.

GL Linux Servers downtime Monday 11/9/09 6:30am-7am

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 07:45:16 -0500

Critical security patches have been released for our GL Linux systems. The patches have been tested internally with no issues. We will be pushing those out to the GL Lab workstations this morning (Friday 11/6). In order to minimize service impact, we will be taking a small downtime window on Monday 11/9, from 6:30am - 7am to apply the same patches to our GL Login servers.

Bb Will Be Down 11/6, 10 p.m. to 11/7, 6 a.m.

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 19:01:56 -0500

To address issues with web browser compatibility and back up the system before applying latest patches and hot fixes, DoIT will be taking the main Blackboard system down from 10 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 6, to 6 a.m. on Saturday, Nov. 7. Reminder: More info about why DoIT needs scheduled downtime.

24/7 Blackboard Support Starts Wed, Nov. 11

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:32:31 -0500

As indicated in the August 24 "Challenges and Changes to Blackboard Support" announcement, UMBC's Division of Information Technology (DoIT) will begin working with Presidium Learning to provide basic Blackboard support starting Wednesday, Nov. 11. The DoIT Help Desk and Instructional Technology staff will still provide walk-in and by-appointment Bb support, but all students, faculty and staff will be able to get 24/7 Blackboard support via phone, IM chat or online knowledge base. Based in Lexington, Kentucky, Presidium specializes in answering technical support questions for faculty, staff, and students at more than 700 educational institutions, and provides a 95 percent first call resolution rate.

LDAP master downtime 11/14/09 10am-4pm

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 08:10:25 -0500

On Saturday 11/14/09 LDAP master will be down 10am-4pm to move to new server hardware. The following services will be unavailable during this time: - Calendar (for the first hour only) - Password changes via Webadmin - Email forward changes (Webadmin) - Changing of campus information (Webadmin)

Update on Web Services Outage

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 10:45:26 -0500

This morning at approximately 1:00AM we suffered a hardware failure that interrupted myUMBC and campus web page (e.g. www.umbc.edu) services. The problem was reported at 6:30AM today and DoIT staff began working on the problem remotely. Our response team arrived on campus by 7:15AM and had all services restored by 8:15AM today. We are currently examining logs and other records to determine what caused this hardware failure to ensure it does not occur again. This outage only affected the web services listed above. Peoplesoft, Blackboard, and E-mail were unaffected by this outage.

Re-Register for E2Campus By Oct 31

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 10:19:24 -0500

A recent change to the authentication system for E2Campus means that all members of the UMBC community need to re-register for emergency campus text messages. If you registered your phone prior to August 26, 2009 you MUST login through myUMBC under your personal profile and notifications or directly at: https://my.umbc.edu/personal/notifications/ Users who have not re-registered by October 31, 2009 will no longer receive UMBC alerts. FAQs I already registered for E2Campus, can I migrate my old account? Unfortunately, existing accounts cannot be migrated. All existing users will need to re-register with E2Campus. Since we now know who the person is relative to UMBC's identity management system we will not need to do future re-registrations. How long before my existing E2Campus account is deleted? Existing E2Campus accounts will remain functional through October 31, 2009. UMBC will purge the old accounts after this date, thus leaving the new accounts in place. If I re-register now will I get two text messages sent to my phone? Users that have re-registered but still have an old account (i.e. until Oct 31st) will not receive duplicate text messages. E2campus can tell if the same phone number is in their system for more than one account, and will only send one message to that phone number. After October 31, 2009, old UMBC accounts that have the same phone number as new accounts will be deleted. Why is UMBC changing the system? Background: E2Campus was initially setup to use external, non-UMBC accounts. This meant that users had to create a user name and password that was hosted at E2Campus. This presented a few challenges for UMBC. -There was no way to know a user’s affiliation (Faculty, Staff or Student) -We can't tell if a user is still affiliated with the university (e.g. graduated, quit, terminated etc.) -Users forgot both user name and password but UMBC DoIT Help Desk could not assist. Solution: DoIT worked with E2Campus to be the first campus nationally to use the Shibboleth authentication standard to provide single sign on (SSO) ability. This means that users will no longer need to create an external account with E2campus. Instead UMBC is the identity provider and passes this information to E2Campus. Benefits of New Authentication System: - We know who the person is and their affiliation (e.g. student, staff, faculty, grad student etc.) - We know the person’s status (graduated, quit etc.) - There is no password to remember since the login is done via SSO from myUMBC. - We can purge/delete old accounts of people who have left the University

Windows 7 Is Here But Don't Rush an Upgrade

Fri, 23 Oct 2009 11:05:37 -0500

Windows 7 Microsoft released Windows 7 on October 22, 2009. DoIT staff have been actively testing the Beta versions of Windows 7. Initial results from the testing are promising. The new interface is more streamlined, the boot times are faster and many features that worked just barely under Vista now work flawlessly. While testing has gone reasonably well DoIT will not officially support Windows 7 until February 2010. We encourage waiting a few months before upgrading existing systems to Windows 7. This will allow many of the bugs and lagging application and driver support to catch up thus preventing problems for users.

UMBC "Check My Activity" Reports for Students Now Available Inside Blackboard

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 22:19:29 -0500

Based on user response to a system-wide announcement in all UMBC Blackboard courses this past week, the Division of Information Technology (DoIT) has made a permanent link to the self-service "Check My Activity" (CMA) reporting tools for students on the myBlackboard tools menu.

CIRC Software Workshop Schedule

Wed, 30 Sep 2009 12:53:20 -0500

The workshops last for one hour and are held during Free Hour (12 noon - 01 pm) in ENGR 122, an instructional computer lab in the Engineering Building at UMBC. Though the seating is limited, no sign-up is required; we will accommodate as many people as possible. http://www.umbc.edu/circ/workshops/

Peer Instruction Workshop

Wed, 30 Sep 2009 11:10:30 -0500

Peer Instruction Workshop Thurs, Nov. 12, 2009, 10 a.m. - 12 p.m., UC 312 Limited to 30 participants

Eric Mazur is the Balkanski Professor of Physics and Applied Physics at Harvard University. An internationally recognized scientist and researcher, he leads a vigorous research program in optical physics and supervises one of the the largest research groups in the Physics Department at Harvard University.

Confessions of a Converted Lecturer

Wed, 30 Sep 2009 11:04:49 -0500

Lecture: Confessions of a Converted Lecturer Wed, Nov. 11, 2009, 6-7 p.m. LHV (Engineering Bldg.)