ACO Meeting Minutes April 27, 2017

Minutes of the Arts Computing Department meeting held on April 27, 2017

Present:  D. Keenan, R. Park, S. Hartung, K. McGowan, H. Balagtas, S. Speers, N. Bromley, S. Paterson, J. Schildroth, W. Lewis, T. Marshall-Taylor

Co-ops:   M. DiGiacomantonio, L. Glofcheskie, J. Hillo

Regrets: M. Byerley, C. Wallace

Attendees:

  • Sherry
    • There are 59 (43 non-Psychology departments, 16 Psychology) faculty eligible for 2017 Faculty Rollover computers. Finalizing form functionality, then emails to go out to non-Psychology departments first to request computer choices. Psychology IT wishes to discuss with their eligible faculty first. Timing of Dell change of models and pricing negotiations with OEMC will delay purchasing of high-end models. Expecting Macs to be ordered in early May.
    • Unit4, our new accounting system, will be going live on May 1st for the new fiscal year. Some accounts still to be determined, campus-wide forms to be updated with new account information, reporting still to be determined. Delays in purchasing, form submission and reporting may be experienced as details are worked through.
  • Dawn
    • Co-op Project Bank update:
      • We need to maintain a list of projects to be done by our Computing Assistants or Technical Writer during their work terms.
      • Currently there is no small programming projects for Computing Assistants.
      • Looking for ideas of work to be done to improve functionality and be useful within the Faculty of Arts. Projects are to provide tools, documentation or infrastructure improvements that we need and will use in ACO or in Arts.
      • Keep in mind there is a limited time in the term, not enough for complex learning. Also needs to be appropriate for first or second term students.
      • An ACO staff member is to be in charge of each project.
      • Suggestions discussed: Updates on existing systems and tools in GIT; service catalogue review and update; utilities for Windows in PowerShell; collaboration with other faculties; get co-ops together for a hack-a-thon (Daniel Allen in CS and Mirko Vucicevich in Science would be good resources).
    • Greg McIntyre, Media Technician at Stratford will be moving to full time status to provide technical support and relief for Mark Byerley.
    • Apple Device Enrollment program to be managed by IST (Sandra Laughlin). This program will allow Apple to pre-install our image on new device purchases (computers and tablets) so they arrive already imaged.
    • Campus switch renewal to start mid-2018. IST is replacing all switches and wiring for older existing buildings and updating cabling as necessary.
    • New IST-run student service desk will open in Dana Porter in September 2017. It will be on the main floor where Media.doc used to be.
    • Non-responsive WCMS is now deprecated. Pascal Lectures site will need to be updated. Wendy Phillpot is point of contact for this site.
  • Bob
    • Will be following up with UCIST with concern of visible login information on screens in classrooms.
  • Lindsay
    • Updating survival guide and adding information that has been missed. Replacing people’s names with position titles.
    • Megan Strazds-Esenbergs (student) has been having issues logging into Apple computers. We need her to show us the problem, but she has not returned. This issue may pass to next term.
    • Set up two take home computers for Psychology.
  • Marco
    • Completed second programming project for Nevil.
    • Updating Survival Guide documents.
    • Wrote Outlook 2016 problems and BIOS documents for Survival Guide. Brainstorming more possible documents.
    • Updating surplus systems in CALMS for next term.
    • Replacement podium computer given to Todd for ML 117.
  • Janine
    • Updating ACO web pages to change mailservices references to Office 365.
    • Working on documentation for Jennifer concerning the service catalogue and myWaterloo. Engineering Computing has had several requests to continue supporting myWaterloo after the undergraduate email migration, so they are not shutting down the service in the foreseeable future.
    • Tested email for 2017 Faculty Rollover for Sherry.
  • Keith
    • Moved new server rack, server, monitor, keyboard and mouse to HH 236A. Worked with Sean in installing Windows Server 2016 on the new artsstore3. There is need of some clean-up of that room.
    • Some users experiencing very slow systems due to Chrome spawning processes. Have traced the problem to users who had logged onto systems elsewhere that were collecting data for Chrome AND were in the older Public Access OU. It seems that UEV was enabled for the OU but the UEV settings were not. Nevil identified the missing GPO and it was applied to that OU.
    • Heather Smith reported the Thunderbird application had disappeared. Suspected it was removed because it is now not installed by default. Re-installing the "advertised" Thunderbird app fixed the issue.
    • A Centre for Theoretical Neuroscience server has been moved from Engineering into PAS 1098A. Have moved CTN mailman lists to Artsservices at Chris Eliasmith's request.
    • Exploring ways for Drama students to be able to book studio space as they do not have access to Exchange Calendar. Andrea Chappell is leading a project on booking appointments with advisors that may be helpful. Another possibility is SharePoint calendar.
    • Replaced the failed Dean of Arts Office Xerox 6180 colour printer with the returned Sociology printer of the same type.
  • Herbert
    • Imaged computer with Windows 10 for Stephanie Lluis (ECON) and Jennifer Simpson (DRAMA) to fix the Chrome issue they were having.
    • Mikal Skuterud’s (ECON) footnote issue was fixed by installing Window 10 on partioned disk.
    • Worked on bug fixes for CALMS as well as email notification feature. Updating new account change in CALMS. Decided to retain old account table and archive details, then set up new table for new accounts.
    • Web Advisory Committee updates:
      • Blogging platform collaborate.uwaterloo.ca is being discontinued.
      • Working on using the conference WCMS theme that was converted for single page sites into apps for use in ACO. Template will provide consistent appearance.
    • Two more jobs have been received for SAF in OFAS. Working on version 3 instead of updating current version. Some features currently not used will be removed and new features added. To include responsive design and accessibility requirements.
  • Sean
    • Updated Adama to MacOS 10.11. Profile manager reconfigured, enrollment package created for Munki and pushed out to ECH/PAS labs.
    • There is no current schedule for Artsfile server patching, resulting in a lot of patches to download each time. Would like to set up a regular schedule to better maintain downloads (could be done once a month or term). Scott suggested to tie in with the Thursday morning reboots.
    • Improved Bacula configuration to allow for synthetic full saves using virtual tape changer. Plan to use this setup on new backup server, which is being seeded with data from Cygnus2.
    • Winter 2017 Course Evaluation results pull is complete. Set up as single PDF reports for all courses and departments for easier distribution.
    • Removing Office 2011 from PAS and adding 2016 (Word, Excel and Powerpoint). Will do the same for ECH. Also removing CS6 Master Suite and replacing with Creative Cloud. Did not include Outlook or OneNote since we believe these applications are not used by students given Office 365 availability. Due to a March 9th certificate expiration, needed to package a new version.
    • Winter 2017 updates processed, tested and put into production for Arts Grad database.  
  • Nevil
    • Our work flow of prestaging AD computers has been causing issues with SCCM duplicating objects, resulting in failed software and Windows updates. We are changing our imaging process to eliminate the problem.
    • Updated SCCM script for automated reporting.
    • Working on pending file cleanup (33 retired, 13 others to leave, 73 inbound, 44 not in Arts anymore). Hesitant to remove some if they still need Arts resources: these can be added to the existing exception list.
    • Working on migrating from VMWare in SWORDC to Hyper-V.
  • Scott
    • Updated common apps [Adobe Acrobat Reader DC (2015.006.30306), Adobe Flash Player 25.0.0.148, Mozilla Firefox 45.9.0 ESR, Google Chrome 58.0.3029.81, Java 8 Update 131, Adobe Acrobat Pro DC (2015.006.30306), Adobe Acrobat XI Pro (11.0.20)].
    • Adobe Acrobat XI Pro is coming to end of life in October 2017, so purchase of newest version will be required for several computers in Arts.
    • R Task Sequence deployments updated for Tuesday in all public labs, and Wednesday night for all of Psychology.
    • Imaging issues were fixed. IST had changed their Sysprep answer file, which caused imaging failures. Removed old Task Sequences and currently deploying only the April 1st image.
    • Final evaluations will be done on April 28th, the co-ops last day.
    • Co-op interview dates have been set for next term as June 6th for the Computing Assistant (with Nevil) and June 2nd for the Technical Writer (with Will).
    • Fixed Brigitte Schneebeli's Thunderbird issue (3 versions installed). No response back yet if it’s working. Todd will check with her so the RT can be closed.
    • Redeploying UW Emerge for those with two versions running in the task bar. Confirmed with Keith that the current unattended install does remove all versions (uses Process Kill) and re-installs. Psychology was re-done on Wednesday, April 26th.
    • Adobe Acrobat Pro XI deployed Wednesday night. There may be issues with Acrobat Pro taking over the default PDF viewer.
    • Scott is coordinating work with SAS and IST to create a virtual SAS application. When licensing is in place, we will test in HH 280 lab. Hope is we will not need to include SAS in the image or as a separate package when we reimage the last between spring and fall terms.
  • Jameson
    • Rectified SCCM Task Sequence Imaging issues.
    • Psychology was having problems with PowerChute deployment. Determined that detection method was causing problems and not allowing the deployment to be marked as installed.
    • Working on GetLocalArtsAdmin script to work with sending cURL commands to insert information into database.
    • [GI-IT] Computer moves, imaging and user additions to GIIT domain.
    • Applied security updates to SQL Server on Nxsartsws.
  • Will
    • Email web pages are much simpler now that all students use Office 365 and cannot forward via WatIAM. Anticipating next steps for Mailservices users. Forwarding to @edu cannot be changed by the user: IT staff with WatIAM privileges can change email forwarding where necessary.
    • No major issues discovered in IST with migration of accounts to Exchange 2016. Some features are slightly different. Depending on needs, individuals can request to be moved ahead of schedule. Suggest all ACO staff be moved next week so they can see it before our clients and prepare for questions. All were in agreement to go ahead.
    • Webstore is still accepting old account numbers until Finance is ready to provide data feed for new Unit4 accounts. Only major change is to how purchasers type in the account number.
  • Todd
    • Notified by Michaela Tatu of Renison that SI 101R and 102R have been cancelled for Spring 2017 and will not need ML 113. Spanish and French labs have now booked in ML 113 for Spring Term. Luis is contact for Spanish.
    • Audio Visual reprogramming and clean-up in ML 117 and ML 101 is going well and should be ready for Monday morning classes. Received a demonstration and sound quality is much improved. Spring 2017 instructors using the room have been kept informed of progress.
    • A request to move SPCOM 223 Section 2 to ML 117 has been granted.
    • Two lab supervisors have been hired for Spring Term. They return from past terms.