News archive - August 2020

Friday, August 28, 2020

Expanding the Campus License for MATLAB

Please forward to faculty, researchers, students and staff who use MATLAB for course work or research.

What is happening? The free temporary campus license for MATLAB expires on August 31, 2020. The Faculty of Engineering and the Faculty of Math have agreed to fund an expanded campus license until September 2021.

New features of the expanded campus license include:

Unlimited access all new and future add-on “toolboxes” at no additional cost
Software available to all UW faculty, staff, and students for non-commercial research and academic use
Accelerator & Startup Program provides UW start-up businesses with one year of free access to MATLAB
Use of MATLAB is extended to high performance computing clusters
Courseware for instructors, including MATLAB Grader service for evaluating students’ code
Extensive training materials through the UW portal on Mathworks’ web site.

All MATLAB users can download and install the software on their own computers or use MATLAB through a browser in the MATLAB Online cloud. For details of how to access MATLAB under this expanded campus agreement, please visit: https://wiki.uwaterloo.ca/display/ISTKB/Download+or+use+MATLAB+online.

Friday, August 28, 2020

Mattermost user accounts being removed - September 4, 2020

What is happening? Most Mattermost user accounts will be removed on Friday, September 4, 2020. IST will maintain a small number of user licenses in Mattermost, for exceptional circumstances, revisited annually. Users associated with the ESG team and CAESR team will not be removed.

Why is this happening? Mattermost was deprecated in September 2019 and has been replaced by Microsoft Teams as the primary campus chat and collaboration tool.

If you no longer require your Mattermost account: No action is required. Your account will be removed on Friday, September 4 at 9:00 a.m. You will not be able to log in to your Mattermost account after this date and content you created will be removed.

If you wish to keep your Mattermost account: Please submit a request to helpdesk@uwaterloo.ca. Requests to keep your Mattermost account will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. IST will make every effort to support your requirements using the Microsoft Teams platform before considering an extension of your Mattermost account.

Questions or concerns? Please contact the IST Service Desk, helpdesk@uwaterloo.ca or ext. 44357.

Thursday, August 20, 2020

Exchange server maintenance: August 30 - September 11

What is happening? Exchange servers are being removed from service for maintenance/updates. Individual servers will be taken out of service between 9:00 and 10:00 p.m. each night throughout the maintenance period.

When is it happening? Sunday, August 30 to Friday, September 11 between 9:00 and 10:00 p.m. each night.

Why is it happening? To keep the software current with vendor-provided updates.

Who will it impact? Users that are actively connected to a server when it is removed for maintenance may be prompted to enter their username and password. Outlook may also alert about being redirected to autodiscover.uwaterloo.ca. This is normal behavior and the user should click 'Allow' when this happens. No other impact is anticipated as the remaining servers will continue to carry out email and calendar functions.

Questions or concerns? Please contact the IST Service Desk, helpdesk@uwaterloo.ca or ext. 44357.

Wednesday, August 19, 2020

git.uwaterloo.ca upgrade - August 22-23

What is happening? The campus Git server (https://git.uwaterloo.ca/) is being upgraded to version 13.2. Git will be unavailable while major storage and application upgrades are performed.

When is this happening? Git will be unavailable from Saturday August 22, 8:00 a.m. to Sunday August 23, 8:00 a.m.

What is the impact? Users will not be able to access https://git.uwaterloo.ca/ during the above maintenance window.

Questions or concerns? Please contact the IST Service Desk, helpdesk@uwaterloo.ca or ext. 44357.

Wednesday, August 12, 2020

Kanopy streaming service now available for use in academic courses

Information Systems & Technology (IST) is pleased to announce the availability of Kanopy, a new on-demand video streaming service for Waterloo faculty and instructors. Existing media streaming services continue to remain available for use, as normal.

Accessing Kanopy: