Topics

1) General News: Staff changes
2) General News: Color Printer Abuse
3) General News: Slidemaker
4) General News: OIT Network Outage
5) General News: It's so quiet; what else is going on?
6) General Tips: Did you know that...?

Chemistry Department Related FAQs:

	http://www.chemistry.ohio-state.edu/compsupp/Faqs/

Newsletter Archive:

        http://www.chemistry.ohio-state.edu/compsupp/Newsletter/

Due to the many hyperlinks, COMPNEWS is best viewed on the web
at the above URL, or by going to the main Chemistry page and
clicking on Internal --> Computer Support --> The Newsletter Archive



1) General News: Staff changes:


We would like to welcome Nicholas Leali, our former student employee, as our
new Windows Administrator. Nick joined our team as a full-time staff member
on November 1, 2001. He was selected from a pool of more than 50 applicants.
He has worked for us since January 2001 and therefore already knows many of
the needs and procedures in the Department. Please extend a warm welcome to
Nick. You can reach him under the collective address
support@chemistry.ohio-state.edu.

Obviously, we're now down one student worker... The search continues :-)


2) General News: Color Printer Abuse:


With great disappointment we must report that our expensive Tektronix Phaser
360 Color printer (located in 2105 NW) was damaged sometime in October. We
did not find out about the extent of the damage for as much as a week
(thinking that the printer merely needed cleaning again). The part that was
damaged turned out to be the print drum, deep inside the printer (near its
center).

The repairman informed us that the drum would have had to be scratched with a
long metal implement, likely in an attempt to clear a paper jam. The person
who did this may not even have known that he/she damaged the printer. We
would like this person to step forward and tell us what occurred so that we
can ensure it doesn't happen again. If you think you may have damaged the
printer, please send email to support@chemistry.ohio-state.edu.

We have procured a replacement printer, a Tektronics Phaser 860, at a cost of
over $5,000. Until further notice, this printer will be kept in 2105B NW and
only accessible to a few users. If you require color printouts of a quality
better than the Phaser 360 is now capable, please contact us and we will
arrange for your printout. Please allow enough time for us to help you.

If the new printer is damaged, it will not be replaced. The older printer
will remain in service and there is NO plan to repair it at this time.


3) General News: Slidemaker:


The slide maker, presently attached to a PC in the Computer Lab 2105 NW, was
rendered inoperable with the recent upgrade to Windows 2000 Professional.
Updated software has been purchased (for both Windows and Mac OS), and the
slidemaker is again working. A previous incident with the camera body which
holds the film has warranted a checkout policy for this vital piece of
equipment. Therefore, if you wish to use the slidemaker, you will need to
make arrangements with Computer Support to acquire the camera body. You can
reserve the slidemaker camera through our online calendar "Calcium" under

  Internal --> Computer Support --> Equipment available for checkout

You will also need to supply your own slide film and arrange for the
developing of the film.

We have not yet tried to use the slidemaker with a Mac, but if you expect
this will be a need in the future, we would appreciate a volunteer to help us
test this new service.


4) General News: OIT Network Outage:


Due to a scheduled power outage on Saturday, December 8th for the Baker
Systems Engineering Building, some network services provided by the Office of
Information Technology (OIT) will be unavailable between 7 a.m. and 3 p.m.;
the services that will affected are:

  E-mail service on OIT's postbox system
  Lookups in the electronic directory
  The PeopleSoft HR and University Finance reporting databases (hrrpt and
  fsrpt)
  eReports (BRIO)
  WebCT
  KRC Services

If you have any questions, please call 688-HELP.

Keep in mind that you will be cut-off from your email if you use postbox.
There will be no interruption in service on the departmental servers.


5) General News: It's so quiet; what else is going on?


There haven't been as many user complaints about PC problems since mid-summer
as there used to be (except for an abundance of virus infections of all
kinds). This is a good thing, since end-user problems are usually indicative
of underlying technical or support problems and issues.

We have used the time thus gained to work on a number of important projects,
many of which are behind the scenes. While our customers won't notice many of
them, not doing those projects would mean running out of disk space or not
having any backups when users mistakenly delete files they wanted to keep,
etc. Behind the scenes projects are often the more critical, but less
recognizable component of the work of any computer support group. It is
essential to streamline the day-to-day operations so that there is enough
time to do this essential behind-the-scenes work. Success of streamlining and
of increased efficiency is measured by the (decreasing) number of user
complaints about services that don't work.

With Nick on board as a full-time staff member, we've been taking a more
focused approach on the Windows support side, and we're confident that our
central Windows servers have become as reliable as you have come to expect
and appreciate for many years from our central Unix server.

Among other things, we have been working on the following projects, some of
which will be discussed in more detail in upcoming issues of COMPNEWS:

 - redesign of the departmental web pages

 - continuing work to deploy the new departmental firewall

 - new backup device for Unix server (8-cartridge DDS4-stacker); the backup
   hardware used until now had reached its limits; development of a strategy
   to cope with the expected growth of the backup load over the next few
   years

 - evaluation and purchase of backup software for Windows fileserver
   (Ultraback, an inexpensive but powerful package)

 - evaluation and purchase of rack-mountable 9-bay disk enclosure with dual
   channel Ultra-160 SCSI adapter to expand storage space on the chemistry
   Unix server; we ran out of disk slots after 6 research groups purchased
   their own disks over the past year

 - investigation of Gigabit Ethernet links for our main servers

 - printer accounting and charging


6) General Tips: Did you know that...?


 ... you are supposed to send all requests and problem reports to

        support@chemistry.ohio-state.edu

     and NOT to individual members of the support staff? Otherwise, you might
     not get any response if one of us is sick, on vacation, or very busy
     with other tasks.

 ... you can map your Windows U: share as

        \\windows\username$

      and your Unix home directory as

         \\unix\username

      from all Windows computers in the Department? Your U: share lives
      on the "windows" file server, while your Unix home directory lives
      on the "chemistry" Unix server.

 ... the preceeding information can be found on the web under

        Internal --> Computer Support --> PC and Mac information -->
                  --> Windows FAQ     ?

     Whenever any information changes, this document and all the FAQs are
     updated in a timely fashion.

 ... our FAQs on the web pages contain lots of information about
     recurring problems? Check them out under

        Internal --> Computer Support --> Chemistry Department Related FAQs

     If you have a question that looks like something that somebody else may
     have asked already, try checking the FAQs first.

 ... we perform daily backups of Unix home directories on the chemistry
     Unix server, as well as daily backups of all U: shares on the Windows
     file server?

 ... if you get a message from someone telling you that IBM or another computer
     company just released info about the latest and most terrible
     virus, this message is very likely a hoax? See

        Internal --> Computer Support --> Security and Virus Information

 ... laptops being taken in and out of the Department represent a huge
     security exposure against which our firewall and other tools are
     powerless? Unless you have secured your latop, have disabled unnecessary
     services, have kept up with patches and are running a personal firewall,
     it is only a question of time until desaster strikes.

 ... you must not yourself deploy wireless access points (e.g. Apple
     Airports) anywhere in the Department? Open (unauthenticated) access
     points are in violation of University policies; they would allow anybody
     on the streets to get behind our firewall and onto our network. Current
     wireless encryption is inadequate. Deployment of wireless services in
     the Department will require careful study, design and implementation.

     There will be more on wireless networking in upcoming COMPNEWS issues.

Happy Thanksgiving!

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