its in bits

In this issue

A Note from Bill...
IT Services Holiday Party
IT Services Holiday Breakfast
Winter Closure
SUNet ID Rate to Increase
Video Helplets
The Mailman Cometh, Redux
Forsythe Hall Generator Test
Data Security
its in bits Schedule
Survey
Staff Profile
Staff Happenings
Tech Sessions
Tech Training Classes
IT Employment Opportunities at Stanford
Quote of the Week

Past Issues

Survey

Results from last issue's survey question: Have you attended a sports event on campus this year?

There were 52 responses. 17 said "yes" and 35 said "no."

Staff Profile

Christine Wynkoop has been at Stanford since 1986. She joined IT Services in 1991.

How would you describe your current job responsibilities?

I work in the Technical Facilities group within Shared Application Services. I also function as a Financial Management Analyst and Departmental Property Administrator for IT Services.

I have a broad list of duties that includes assisting property managers with their responsibilities and configuring new departmental equipment. Establishing and maintaining property records. Maintaining shipping records and RMA's (Return Merchandise Authorization). Maintaining movement and disposition of assets if lost or stolen. Working with Environmental Health & Safety. Preparing for disposals, surplus, and trade-ins of capital and non-capital equipment for pick-up or new locations.

Yes, there's more! Conducting biennial inventories working closely with the Property Management Office and inventory groups. Maintaining an on-going awareness of organizational activities that are related to property management. Advising and researching questions on property age, disposal hazards, and equipment value. Phew!

Which aspects of your job do you enjoy the most?

The most enjoyable part of my job is seeing the results and working with a great bunch of people across IT Services across the campus. I like to see people happy, so I always try and give them a little laughter. I'm in the happiest place in my 20 years with Stanford and have the best manager (who supports me 100% on what I do and how I get it done).

What did you do before you came to Stanford?

Sold sporting equipment to football and baseball leagues across the USA.
Worked in the garment industry.
Sold advertising blimps.

What do you like to do when you're not at work?

I belong to non-profit organization called ALFA (Another Life For Animals) and we conduct low cost spay/neuter clinics.

I love cooking, entertaining, being with my animals, and walking on the beach where I live in Half Moon Bay.

Best of all I love being a Mom to my 16 year-old daughter...who thinks she's the Mom!

What is your favorite movie, book, song?

Favorite movie: Shrek
Favorite book: J.R.R. Tolkien; The Hobbit & Lord of the Rings
Favorite song: Van Morrison; Into the Mystic

Staff Happenings

Adel Yabut, a member of our Help Desk staff since July of 2004, has taken a position at the Administrative Systems Help Desk. Adel will be providing support for the Oracle, PeopleSoft, and other campus business applications supported by AS. She begins her new role on Monday, December 4. We wish her well with the new responsibilities and will miss her on our team.

- Steve McLenegan
Client Support; Help Desk Services

I am pleased to announce that Vicki Hallett has been selected as the Service Desk Senior Technologist and will now begin building the Service Desk team to fulfill its role in the Order Management Redesign project. Vicki's passion for customer service and detailed experience with many of our ordering processes, along with her knowledge of our Pinnacle and Remedy applications, should give her many tools for success.

Her first task with be filling the four new Service Desk positions authorized by the OMR project. She'll transition from her current position in the coming weeks, and will be moving to Acacia where the Service Desk will be co-located with the Help Desk staff. Please congratulate Vicki in her new role!

- Chris Lundin
Client Support; Help Desk Services

Carlos Zertuche is reporting to Nan McKenna effective December 1. He has joined the Service Consulting group and will retain the focus on Communications products.

- Jay Kohn
Shared Communication Services

Dani Aivazian is relocating to San Diego. Fortunately, she will be continuing to work part-time for IT Services on a few internal initiatives including mentoring, client interaction skills, technical job competency, and five-year planning. Dani will be reporting to me on these activities. Her contact information will remain the same.

- Jan Cicero
Client Support

its in bits welcomes more detailed employee news submissions from all staff. Please submit to itsinbits-submissions@lists.stanford.edu

Tech Briefings / Tech Express

Tech Briefings: Captivate and Contribute

Adobe Captivate 2 can be used to author scenario-based training content, enhance your blogs with screencasts, or export audio for podcasting. Create many different content types with flexible deployment options without having to learn Flash.

Adobe Contribute 4 lets you update existing web sites and blogs quickly, easily, and safely. Content authors and contributors can edit or update any web site or blog in three simple steps. Post and publish content from within Microsoft Office applications.

Turing Auditorium
Friday, December 8
2:00 to 3:30 p.m.
John Schuman; Adobe, presenting

Check the Tech Briefings home page for specials and last-minute additions.

Tech Express: Changes to Docushare

Come see the changes to the Docushare system at noon on November 7th in Turing Auditorium. This presentation will give you a first look at the upgrade, a handout detailing changes to the system, and a navigation demonstration.

The upgraded Docushare system has been available since November 21st.

Thursday, December 7
12:00 to 1:00 p.m.
Turing Auditorium
Ammy Hill, presenting

Check the Tech Express home page for future sessions and to subscribe to the mailing list.

Technology Training Courses

Upcoming Tech Training classes of interest to IT Services staff.

Thursday, Dec 7, IT Services Site Training (TS-8301), 1:30 to 4:00, Free
Friday, Dec 8, Excel Level 2 (ITS-1122), 9:00 to 4:00, $275
Monday, Dec 11, Tips and Tricks In Sundial (ITS-2301), 1:00 to 4:30, Free
Monday, Dec 11, MySQL Workshop (ITS-2523), 9:00 to 4:00, $275
Wednesday, Dec 13, Access Reports and Forms (ITS-1715), 9:00 to 4:00, $275
Wednesday, Dec 13, Introduction to ReportMart1 (ITS-8401), 1:30 to 4:30, Free
Thursday, Dec 14, Dreamweaver Lite (ITS-2601), 1:00 to 4:30, $150

Classes with low enrollments may be cancelled one week in advance. More information on courses, registration, and training is available at the Technology Training Services site.

- Leni Silberman
Client Support; Technology Training Services

IT Employment Opportunities

There were four new job postings for IT Services this week.

Req.#23116: Change Management Analyst, 100% FTE, continuing position, Range 4P4, Bryan Wear, hiring manager.

This position is responsible for providing product ownership and leadership to the change management application and process. In addition, the incumbent will chair the Change Advisory Board, identify, track and consolidate bugs and enhancement requests, and manage metrics reporting and analysis, including ad-hoc reporting as needed.

Req.#23146: Senior Database Administrator, 100% FTE, continuing position, Range 4P5, Bryan Wear, hiring manager.

Operations duties include support of Oracle DBMS on RedHat Linux and Solaris, as well as MySQL on Linux. Install, configure, and support of Oracle relational database management (RDBMS) including Oracle/RAC and related software, understanding of application use of DB, basic UNIX system administration skills, and effective oral and written communication skills.

Req.#23148: Application Administrator, 100% FTE, continuing position, Range 4P3, Bryan Wear, hiring manager.

This position is responsible for the effective operation of Stanford’s Remedy-based applications, including HelpSU, the University’s request tracking system, BenefitSU, and other Remedy applications. In addition, the incumbent will provide primary support for the JourneyX Timesheet system, the Infra Change Management system, and secondary support for other applications.

Req.#23217: Sr. Backbone Network, 100% FTE, continuing position, Range 4P3, David Macia, hiring manager.

This position will be responsible for the planning, engineering, deployment, and technical operations of firewalls, VPNs, and other network security devices. Staff is expected to participate in the on-call rotation.

To view the complete listings or to apply for a position, visit the StanfordJobs web site at: jobs.stanford.edu.

There are other open Information Technology positions at Stanford. To see what other opportunities exist on campus, link to the full list of all open IT positions at Stanford

Quote of the Week

“Cross-country skiing is great...if you live in a small country.”

- Steven Wright

News

A Note from Bill...

I hope that all of you had a restful and relaxing Thanksgiving holiday. I find these especially relaxing because, like Winter Break, everyone else is gone too and the work does not pile up while I am off with family and friends.

Speaking of relaxing, I have now completed my ergonomics assessment, and I definitely find my shoulders less hunched and tense at the end of the day. I found out from the folks in CRC that we have installed over a hundred and fifty new workstations, along with a large number of chairs, keyboard trays, etc. While the massages have also been very popular, I urge you to also look through the HIP catalog for other avenues to de-stress and support our well-being. I have watched the Tai Chi class on Wednesdays at noon in Jordan Quad, and have taken some classes that have really helped me physically and mentally. The trap is to think we don’t have time, when in fact, these efforts increase our creativity and productivity well beyond the time spent.

I have been visiting quite a lot of your workgroups recently and have been pleased to see so many happy and productive groups. Autumn Quarter can be very intense with client requests at their peak and the need to help and support many new students, faculty, and staff. Thanks to everyone’s hard work we have not only handled it well, but also significantly reduced the backlog of trouble tickets during this very busy time.

We continue to work on our three-year Strategic Plan and have started collecting feedback from faculty and staff. So far, the response has been very positive. We are looking to complete our plan by May, and then will work to incorporate it into a university-wide IT plan. In the coming weeks, I will be writing about various aspects of the plan.

Now, we have just a few busy weeks to do everything for the end of the year. Fortunately, that work culminates in the IT Services Holiday Party on December 14th, which promises, once again, be a lot of fun. I look forward to seeing you all there.

- Bill Clebsch
IT Services

IT Services Holiday Party: Don't Forget to RSVP

The annual IT Services holiday party will be held again this year at the Stanford Faculty Club. The party will kick off with cocktails and jazz at 5 p.m., followed by dinner and a presentation from…not Santa...not Randy...but…John Klemm! (Yes, John just couldn't resist the opportunity to fire one more shot o'er the gunnels.) The jazz combo will return for post-dinner dancing.

We'll be collecting gifts at the holiday party again this year for the Toys for Kids drive. A collection box will be in the lower-level lobby of the faculty club. Please don't wrap gifts. (If you can't make the party but would still like to make a donation, please leave it with Caren Kammeyer in Polya 262.)

Tomorrow, December 7, is the last day to RSVP. Send email to its-rsvps@lists.stanford.edu by 5 p.m. If you will be bringing a guest, please be sure to let us know.

IT Services Holiday Party
Thursday December 14, 5 to 9...9:30…10? p.m.
Stanford Faculty Club, Lower Level

- IT Services Holiday Party Committee
Jan Cicero, Caren Kammeyer, Christopher Kittle, & Christine Wynkoop

IT Services Holiday Breakfast

Following an annual tradition, but expanding the guest list to all of IT Services, the Client Relations group invites all IT Services staff to a holiday breakfast on Friday, December 15, from 9:00 to 11:00 a.m. in Polya Hall. Yes, this will be the morning after the IT Services Holiday Party at the Faculty Club, so plan on either continuing the celebration—or recovering from it—with more food and fellowship in the familiar but festively decorated Polya conference rooms.

For more information, or to volunteer to help with preparation and/or cleanup, contact Nan McKenna.

- Jane Marcus
Client Support; Account Management

Winter Closure

A detailed email will be sent to all IT Services staff later today containing details about Winter Closure and Kronos entries. We wanted to pass along some summary information and additional reminders.

Completing Kronos Records:
You will need to enter your leave in Kronos for the entire month of December prior to the start of the Winter Closure period. As you enter your leave, please pay attention to the following information and deadlines:

Please complete your Kronos record entry (through December 31, 2006) by end of day on Wednesday, December 13, 2006. The Kronos application is available at http://axess.stanford.edu
You will need to enter leave values for the following dates: December 20-22 and December 28-29 (a total of five days). Be sure to save the information after you have updated your leave record.
The official University holidays during Winter Closure are December 25, 26, and January 1. Exempt staff should leave these dates blank when entering leave. Non-exempt staff will have these holidays hours granted to them automatically (you don't have to do anything special).
Since IT Services is observing the University's Winter Closure plans, each employee is granted an extra day with pay by the University. We have designated December 27 as the extra day. Exempt employees should leave this day blank (do not enter it as vacation or other leave). Non-exempt employee should enter their regular work schedule for this day (treat it as a normal work day).
Additional details regarding Kronos leave entry for Winter Closure is contained in today's memo to IT Services staff.

Pay Day Changes:
Pay day (for the pay period ending December 15) will be Tuesday, December 19. Direct deposits will be deposited to accounts on this day by 5:00 p.m. Online pay statements will be available in Axess for all employees, including those who receive live paychecks, on December 19, 2006.

General Information:
As you know, IT Services will once again participate in the University's plan to close many of its offices and operations between close of business on Tuesday, December 19 through January 1, 2007. A small number of IT Services staff will be on hand to support University offices that must remain open. These staff members will provide operator service, monitor and support critical applications, process high-priority service orders, and provide priority response to urgent HelpSU requests. IT Services will resume full operational service effective 8:00 a.m. on Tuesday, January 2, 2007. We have been communicating this information to our clients. If you would like to see what we are saying to them about what to expect, you can review it at: http://itwinterclosure.stanford.edu

We invite all IT Services staff members to consider extending their Winter Closure plans to include Monday and Tuesday, December 18 and 19, 2006. Please work with your manager to decide if your vacation plans can be extended without creating major disruptions to our operational responsibilities. We expect business on campus will be slow and encourage you to take these extra days off.

- Nancy Ware
Planning & Communication

Video Helplets

Captivate is a software program from Adobe that creates audio/visual simulations, demonstrations, and training videos. The end result is a stand-alone “Video Helplet” that can be emailed, embedded in other software programs, or placed on the Web. Documentation, Design, and Delivery (DDD) has been working with Technology Training to see if “Video Helplets,” produced in Captivate, would be beneficial to clients.

There are a number of self-help web pages in place across IT Services. As a test to determine if a Video Helplet would prove to be beneficial, we targeted resetting and changing the SUNet ID password. This process is often high on the HelpSU “Top Ten FAQ” list. The approach to the project was storyboarded, scripted, captured, voiced, and edited within Captivate. You can view two of the examples produced by DDD and Tech Training:

- Changing Your SUNet ID Password
- Resetting Your SUNet ID Password

There is a Tech Briefing this Friday on the latest release of Captivate if you would like to learn more. DDD and Tech Training will be evaluating the new Video Helplets on other projects in the future.

- Tom Wiggins
Client Support; Documentation, Design, & Delivery

The Mailman Cometh, Redux

The Majordomo to Mailman @lists service reached another milestone Saturday morning when the @lists.stanford.edu service name shifted to the Mailman systems.

On Monday, December 3rd, majordomo had 545 lists remaining on it. 343 of these lists are tied to the GSB and are targeted to transition Thursday, 12/7. Six other lists are associated with the School of Medicine postdoc program which should be moving Thursday as well. We are working with folks in these groups to complete the move of their lists.

The remaining 196 lists are now deemed "orphaned" as we were unable to contact or identify any active owner. These remaining lists are now all pointing to majordomo-deactivated@responder.stanford.edu and a response will be sent to any message that is targeted for those lists. It states that the list is "de-activated" and will "die" on December 20th unless an owner steps forward via a HelpSU request.

The UNIX Systems group anticipates completely shutting down the old Majordomo system before we all depart for the Winter Closure.

Thanks to everyone: Xueshan Feng, Kevin Hall, Meei-you Lee, Hua Zheng, the DDD group, Jason Cowart, Adam Seishas, and many others for your contributions to this a year-and-a-half-long project!

- Tim Torgenrud
Shared Application Services; Integration & User Experience

Forsythe Hall Generator Compliance Test

In the early hours of November 4th, while most people were still soundly asleep, a twenty-three member team was on-site to perform the first annual generator compliance test at Forsythe Hall. This test, which is mandated by the Bay Area Air Quality Control Board (BAAQCB), requires that all buildings equipped with a stand-by emergency generator be tested to insure that each of the system components which make up the emergency power system work as designed. Sounds simple enough, right?

Most buildings at Stanford are typically protected behind a single generator, a single utility feed, and a single automatic transfer switch (ATS). Forsythe is a bit more complex in that it is supported by three generators, two separate utility feeds, and a multitude of ATS switches that will react differently depending on which utility feed is disrupted and in what sequence. To add to the complexity is the shear volume of mechanical, plumbing, and electrical systems that support the entire building—particularly the data center itself. The potential risk of adversely effecting 1000’s of pieces of IT Services' and customer-managed hardware can make for some sleepless nights. Oh, and did I mention this level of testing had never been performed at Forsythe?

Planning for this test began in early August of 2006. Representing the Technical Facilities department throughout the entire planning effort was Tom Prussing. A point of clarification: Tom happens to be the official “Building Manager” of record for building facilities-related issues in Forsythe. This honor was bestowed upon him two years ago by me. Talk about dodging a bullet!

Tom, along with representatives from the University Electric Shop, Hi-Volt Shop, HVAC, Plumbing Shop, EMCS, EH&S, Garage, Zone “B” Management, Onan Cummings, US Powers, Cupertino Electric, PCG, OSC, Advanced Power Systems, Enersys, and Technical Facilities would comprise the full team. The known headcount involved in the planning effort was 32, which made scheduling and coordination extremely challenging.

On the day of the test everyone was already on-site by 0330. Turns out most of us could not get a good night's sleep so it was best just to get there early. At 0400 a detailed six page script was given to each participant outlining the who, what, where, and when for each phase of the test. Last-minute instructions were given to all and each member was then dispatched to their assigned location.

The testing began at approximately 0500 with the shut down of the first utility power feed by the Hi-Volt shop. Every critical mechanical, electrical, and plumbing system component was observed and the reaction to the various utility disruptions documented. Much of my time was spent at the generator locations keeping my fingers crossed that they would start when they were supposed to, checking in with Pat and Allen on the 2nd floor machine room to see if all the hardware was still on-line, and then climbing up to the penthouse to check in with US Powers to see how the UPS’s were holding up. By 0700, all tests were successfully completed and all building systems returned to normal.

The level of planning and commitment by all people involved in this effort was nothing short of exceptional. The risks were extremely high and each and every participant stepped up and took ownership of the outcome. A special thanks to Tom Prussing, Dave Stanton, Joy Willingham, and Daragh Conway for the leadership you each provided throughout the entire process.

- Bob Moya
Shared Application Services; Technical Facilities

Data Security and Computer Management

On September 1, 2006, the University Information Security Office and Property Management Office issued new security guidelines for the disposal or transfer of data storage devices.

Responsibility to ensure data security rests with the individual user of any computer or data storage device at Stanford. This includes servers and external disk drives in data centers as well as office areas. It is incumbent upon the end-user to make certain that all data has been properly removed from the hard drive (to Department of Defense standards) before a computer is transferred, disposed of, or removed from Stanford. As an alternative, the hard drive itself can be removed and destroyed. It is the responsibility of the user's department to provide the resources to enable them to meet the obligation.

Any computer being scrapped must have the hard drive completely sanitized or removed from the CPU and submitted for destruction. There are no exceptions to this policy. The CRC staff supporting IT Services staff and other campus departments comply with this policy and utilize the recommended procedures.

If you have equipment to be disposed, please enter a HelpSU ticket and the CRC will work with you. But, so you are aware, there are three options for achieving this:

Department wipes the drive clean using Department of Defense certified data destruction program(s). The University recommends "Darik's Boot and Nuke" (D-BAN), a free program available on the Web, or obtaining a CD and/or floppy disk from PMO. Other programs are available on the Web or in the marketplace, but it is important that any other program used meet Department of Defense standards.
Physically remove the hard drive from the CPU and destroy it or submit it for destruction. The drive may be included in a scrap excess request for the computer, or a separate request can be generated for "orphan" drives or a quantity of drives collected for scrap. Please ensure loose drives are kept in a secure location until they are collected for destruction.
For those departments without CRC contracts or local computer support staff, use our On-Call Services to have the hard drive sanitized. IT Services currently charges $99/hour for the service. The length of time varies depending on drive size and other factors.

New stickers have been developed to affix to computers. The completed sticker indicates whether the drive has been sanitized or removed (green = removed, red = sanitized). In both cases, the computer tag number or serial number, date, and name/signature of the responsible person is required on the sticker. Computers lacking this sticker will not be collected for disposal (effective September 1st, 2006).

Data Destruction Kits (aka D2 Kits) have been developed for departments and contain policy documents, the D-BAN disks, instructions for using D-BAN, and starter sets of red and green stickers. Please contact your DPA if you need a kit or labels. Additional supplies of the red and green stickers are currently available from Christine Wynkoop and Sally Davis.

For those of you who already have the D-BAN Data Destruction disks, please keep these disks secure. Running the disk on a computer will irretrievably destroy all data on that computer. Do not leave these disks laying around. They pose a significant hazard to your equipment if misused.

- Christine Wynkoop and Sally Davis
Shared Application Services; Technical Facilities

its in bits Schedule

This will be the last issue of its in bits before Winter Closure. Since the regular "first Wednesday" edition falls on the day after we return to work on January 2nd, we will publish its in bits on the second and fourth Wednesdays during January. The regular "first and third Wednesday of the month" publication schedule will resume in February, 2007.

- The Editors

About its in bits

A regular summary of IT business, news about personnel, and pointers to other information of interest to IT Services staff. Coordinated, compiled, and published by the Communication Strategy and Standards Team. its in bits is published on the first and third Wednesday of the month.

Submissions are due by Noon on the Friday before the scheduled issue, to itsinbits-submissions@lists.stanford.edu for consideration. its in bits is distributed via email to its-all-staff@lists.stanford.edu and the subscription list itsinbits-subscribers@lists.stanford.edu. People outside of IT Services can self-subscribe via mailman.

The next its in bits will be published on Wednesday, January 10, 2007

its in bits | IT Services | Stanford University | Computing & Communication