Entries from August 2012 ↓

Brief Banner maintenance and downtime during Maintenance Window tonight (8/23)

In order to address some slight performance issues that we are seeing with the Banner Forms server, Computing Services must increase system resources to this server. The maintenance will begin after 8 PM, so please ensure that you are logged out of Banner before this time.  Estimated downtime is roughly 1 hour.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause, but feel it is important to make this change in order to provide an even more stable, reliable Banner system during these high usage time periods. Thank you for your patience, and if you have any questions or concerns, please contact the ASU Computing Services Help Desk at computingservices@adams.edu or call us directly at extension 7741.

Thank you,

Computing Services

CS Maintenance & Network Services Interruption for Thursday, 8/9/12

Due to the beginning of fall semester, this is the last week that we will be performing maintenance before the start of classes. We will put off further maintenance until after the semester is in full swing, and will notify the campus again once new maintenance is planned.

In order to ensure that all maintenance can be completed in one evening, we will be starting the following maintenance activities at an earlier time of 6:00 PM. We apologize for any inconvenience that this earlier start-time may create, but we want to ensure all services can be restored before the start of business on Friday.

-Beginning at 6 PM and lasting roughly 2 hours, all network and Internet services will be temporarily unavailable as the campus firewalls are being moved into new equipment racks in our data center. During this time, ALL network service (Internet access, wireless services, Banner, Home and Shared Directories, etc) will be unavailable.

-Immediately following the completion of the firewall moves, we will be performing an upgrade to the Banner Financial Aid module. During this time, all Banner services including Banner Web services for students will be unavailable. All Banner services are anticipated to be restored by 11:00 PM.

-Duplex (double-sided) printing will be set as the default for all Student Computing Labs on campus. This change is in alignment with the campus green initiatives, and is anticipated to cut down on paper waste coming from the student computer labs.

As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact the ASU Computing Services Help Desk at 719-587-7741 or via email at computingservices@adams.edu. Thank you for your patience and support as we finish these critical maintenance tasks before the semester starts.

Computing Services

New Banner Link to Employee Desktop Computers- 8/2

Beginning at 9 PM tonight, (8-2) Computing Services will be remotely copying a new Banner icon to all employee desktop computers on campus. This icon will be called simply “Banner” and will be used for DEVL only. The old icon, “Banner INB” will still be used for all production Banner functions. Please read below for further details and testing instructions:

This new icon is necessary because we will be moving to a new Banner INB server towards the middle of August. This is another of the several necessary hardware/software modifications required by Ellucian in  preparation for Banner 9. We will be taking a stepwise approach for this move. You will be receiving a new ‘Banner’ icon on your desktop in the next several days. It will contain the login to the DEVL database. You will need to use this new icon to get to the  DEVL database, as the DEVL option will be removed from the current Banner INB icon. All Banner users need to test their login to DEVL using the new Banner icon.

When you launch the icon, you will receive one or more prompts regarding java and/or digital security. You need to check the box to “always trust” and then proceed. This is similar to the move we  made in June, below is a link to our how-to article that explains the process:

http://howto.adams.edu/index.php/Inital_Login_to_Banner

Once you successfully login to DEVL, test it by navigating to the forms you use in performing your normal functions. You should see no differences compared to the current forms functionality. You will notice that the font is different, and this is the normal font for the new server.

We anticipate moving PROD to the new Banner icon during the week of August 20th. We will send separate notification to you prior to making that change. If you discover any issues, please submit a service request to the Banner group at Computing Services with the title ‘Banner INB issue’ by visiting our online helpdesk system at http://helpdesk.adams.edu

Thank you for your assistance,

Computing Services

Computing Services Maintenance activities for Thursday, 8/2

Due to the fast approaching beginning of the fall semester, Computing Services is performing several key maintenance activities this week to ensure our systems are ready for the beginning of classes. Typically, all of our scheduled maintenance occurs after 9 PM on Thursday evenings, but due to the need to have vendor support if needed, as well as taking advantage of the reduced number of students currently on campus, a few of the maintenance activities will take place during the day on Thursday, 8/2:

  • Beginning at 8:00 AM, the Bradford system which connects students to our ResNet networks will be down for roughly 30 minutes as we reconfigure our networking layout. Minimal outages to the wireless network on campus are expected, and should be resolved by 8:30 AM.
  • Beginning at noon, the Pcounter system which tracks student printing activity will be shutdown as we finalize the move of equipment to our new server rack. During this time, students may be unable to print in the labs until roughly 12:30.

The rest of our scheduled maintenance for this week will take place after 9:00 PM during our normally scheduled maintenance period:

  • Employee PCs will receive automated security updates and upgrades to the following software packages: Thunderbird, Firefox, Adobe Flash, Adobe Shockwave, and Adobe Reader. Employees are encouraged to log out of their systems but leave them turned on as they leave work on Thursday to assist the completion of these upgrades.
  • The campus File Server which hosts all home and shared directories will be down from roughly 9 PM until midnight for a critical OS upgrade. Other various web services will be briefly unavailable during this time as they receive security patches.

As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact the ASU Computing Services Help Desk at 719-587-7741 or via email at computingservices@adams.edu

Thank you,

Computing Services