Technology Update: Maintenance Saturday, January 23, 2010 12: 00pm to 2:00 pm

Office of the CIO

January 22, 2010

Technology Update for Friday:

The microwave continues to fluctuate with its connection this morning. As a result, a maintenance window has been scheduled for Saturday, January 23, 2010 tomorrow at 12:00 pm to 2:00pm. During this time the microwave will not be operational.

We are currently operating on the alternate radio; the original radio is not working at all. Since the alternate radio has not been utilized in some time, it is not stable, causing the microwave connection to go in and out. More troubleshooting efforts are need to either repair the original radio or stabilize the alternate radio.

Good news is when the microwave goes down all VC rooms, BB, Banner and Banweb will connect through the Internet automatically. Users will access the system the regular way. Please note, during an outage Desktop Outlook will not work on the St. Croix campus users should be encouraged to use exchange.uvi.edu to receive and send email when the microwave is not functioning.

When the microwave is down the quality of the VC product is not the best. The picture is a little blurry but faculty can still communicate with their classes via the VC connection. If the VC connection becomes poor, faculty may choose to conduct class by audio conferencing only. These numbers can be used to connect to the class via audio conferencing. Please be advised that technical support will be available to assist faculty at the beginning of their class. Users can call ITS helpdesk at ext 1466 if assistance is needed.

Please note that the internet connection on STT campus may become slow because of bandwidth usage plus users on the St. Croix campus may experience slow connection rates.

Below are the telephone numbers for each VC room:

Room number STT Phone STT Room number STX Phone STX
B-110 2186 EC-401 3106
T-101 2184 EC-713 3148
T-213 2185 EC-302a 3321
T-115 1187 EC-807 4173
B-101 5003 EC-304 4119





PLEASE KEEP IN MIND:

Please remember to utilize the following instructions when attempting to access technology resources.
• Users on St. Croix campus can access the St. Thomas campus by dialing 693 and the 4 digit extension of the person you are trying to call.
• Users on the St. Thomas campus can access the St. Croix campus by dialing 692 the 4 digit extension of the person you are trying to call.
• To access Audix from the St. Croix campus, dial 693-1599 and login to Audix as usual.
• Users on St. Croix campus are encouraged to connect to Exchange Outlook using the web access exchange.uvi.edu.

• Users on the St. Croix campus may experience slow service to the following applications:
Blackboard
BanWEb
Banner
We will do our best to keep our users informed as we continue to work on this inter-island connection issue. Information and Technology Service apologizes for any inconveniences this outage may have caused.
Thank you in advance for your patience as we work through this issue.

“Service is Key”



Cherie Wheatley
Office of the CIO
Manager,Technology Customer Service





LATER THAT SAME DAY: Inter-island Microwave


Greetings,

First I would like to thank those of you who offered up your office microwave ovens for spare parts and for the bubble gum and bailing-wire that have been delivered to my office. 

The interisland microwave has been operating since approximately 11:45 this morning. We have made adjustments to the equipment at crown mountain in an effort to maintain the connection. We have also sent our last MUX card to St. Croix on the 4:30 Cape Air flight so we can keep the microwave from trying to re-connect on its primary path radios and maintain the connection on the alternate radios. These alternate radios have not been activated for use before yesterday so we are moving carefully and cautiously to make necessary changes. The card will be installed tomorrow morning before 8am in an effort to stabilize the connection. We are going to let the system run tonight in an effort to meet evening class needs.

This evening, we will monitor the system closely. If the radios do lose their connection, the vc and other data systems will automatically move back to the data tunnel over the Internet. So services will be available –except for four digit dial—and low quality on the videoconference pictures even if the microwave fails. Again technicians will be hovering to assist with reconnections or audio connections…whichever best meets the needs of the instructors.

Please let me know if you have any questions. We will continue to investigate options to maintain services and a reasonable learning environment for our students.

Keep your happy thoughts near.

Tina M. Koopmans
Chief Information Officer