Over the last few weeks I have been working to try and collect information from our call tracking system that we have in place at the Help Desk.  The software we use for call tracking is called Numara FootPrints. I have been very happy with the results.  Every week on Wednesday the system e-mails me the total number of people assisted in the last week complete with a summary description chosen by the Help Desk worker.  Last month the Help Desk assisted 800 people, this month the Help Desk assisted 808 people.  I believe these numbers are fairly accurate.  Right now we can only see the numbers of people that have contacted us, but in the next few months we will be able to see the method by which we were contacted and the amount of time it took for us to help each person.

I have always known the Help Desk has been busy, but now I have the numbers to help show how busy we have been.

The last two weeks leading up to the National Youth Gathering were a little insane. I think they’re pretty well wrapping things up so I can look back now and laugh about the whole process. The quick story is that we decided to turn the admission counselors laptops into web servers so they could run a whole website without “the internets”. The problem is, Windows is not the best platform to run a server on. So I had to trouble shoot the process about 35 times. (The last one being over the phone after they were in Florida). But we got it all working!

Students were greeted with a flash movie of about 20 of Drew’s famous pictures of the University throughout all seasons and activities. At any time, students could interrupt the movie to fill out a form requesting more information about the university–including requesting that Comet add them to facebook or myspace. When they submit the form, it resets to the flash movie.

All the info is stored on a flat file on the laptops and we will be able to load them into our system when the counselors get back.

It looks great and is even a little fun. I’m just blown away that the biggest hassle in the whole process was beating Windows into submission!

This week has seen a focus of moving a number of our current servers to a new environment.  This new environment is all virtual.  While all of the servers that have moved have been able to retain their name, IP address, and everything else, this has allowed us to power down the old server.  Less servers = less heat & power = CSP IT going green?  Well, maybe not that far, but it is a start.

The virtual servers also give us the ability to: have better redundancy; get all of our servers on the same maintenance/warranty contract; improved performance; and increased storage capacity.

What does the virtual environment mean for the end user?  Not much.  All the files look the same.  The servers look the same.  All the applications function the same way.  It does mean that IT will be able to better serve the needs of the entire community.

One of the things I pride myself on is my ability to break down the complexity of computers into simple everyday descriptions.  When I was asked to describe the problem that we are experiencing on our Exchange Server here is what I came up with:

All the e-mail at the university is stored in a database in an exchange environment.  This sort of database is similar to a file drawer in your desk that contains hanging file folders.  Each account is a hanging file folder and each e-mail is a piece of paper in the hanging file folders.  At this point there are so many hanging file folders in our drawer that we cannot remove any, nor can we fit any more in the drawer.  When we remove paper from the file folders, it is simply filled up with more paper in other hanging file folders.  So when the I.T. Department opens the file drawer all we see are hanging file folders.  If people remove paper from their folders, it assures more space for future paper, but there is no way in this current system to change our file system.

It made sense to me, I hope it makes sense to others.

Over the last week I have spent some time working to create announcements for the upcoming laptop return and renewal process. Thankfully, I have been able to reuse and update old announcements. We also used the Help Desk Facebook account to create an event in an effort to communicate in a more direct manner to the student body. We have been working to streamline our laptop extension policies and focus on making this laptop return and renewal run even more smoothly than last year.

Laptop Return/Renewal is approaching as the semester nears its imminent end. With the new Help Desk location, we have to rethink a few of our usual plans. I have spent the last few days preparing for the process changes, writing letters ahead of schedule, and sorting out the Help Desk Schedule for they busiest week in the Help Desk year. It has been fun to rethink and old process.

Last night, I finished (most likely) creating WebCT courses shells for every School of Continuing Studies course held this summer.  They total over 100 courses.  So now, every Summer SCS course has a WebCT counterpart for use at anytime.  We have been doing this since the Summer of last year.  Overall, it is great for us to invest a block of time to create courses all at once instead having them spread out.  As well, it is beneficial to have all of the courses created ahead of time to give SCS the chance to create effective course materials and apply them in a timely manner.  On the flip side, I finished deleting 100+ Fall SCS courses (after the term is over, SCS backs up all of the courses for record keeping) and am finishing deleting old cohort cohorts.  Bartlett will be fresh and clean in a matter of days!

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(You’ll have to ask Brock for a translation).

I am touching all my active projects and either finishing them up or passing them on to those who will cary them forward. This week I begin cross-training with Micah, squeezing every last drop of information about the web at CSP out of his long-haired head. It’s always fun learning new things, but it’s also a little strange to let go of old projects. Whether you realize it or not, you really do invest a lot of energy and time into them, and they become like little pets.

Goodbye little pets.

From Heather:

As you may or may not know, our annual WebCT license key expires tomorrow.  As is always the case, they do not send the keys until a few days before and, as is always the case, the renewal process has not been a smooth one.  Our current status is that Bartlett (backup server) was rebooted due to a system malfunction and the key has been applied successfully.  The renewal information that we received for Chronicles indicated the wrong Host/IP address so it will not accept the renewal key.  Work order 453390 has been opened with “BlackCT”.  I will send a confirmation when I have successfully applied the renewal for the live server.

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We are currently testing the installation of a new security monitoring device called Cisco MARS. Basically it watches the network for anamolies by aggregating logs from all of our servers, and network devices. It does everything from watching for IIS or Apache getting hacked to virus outbreaks. It can trace a virus outbreak back to the first machine that was infected and allows us to stop the outbreak by shutting down ports as need. Pretty interesting stuff. We are hoping that it will shed some light on our bandwidth issues as well.