Academic Support Computer Rep General Meeting

Thursday June 10, 2010

10:30 am - 12 noon, NH 3001

Minutes

Agenda

• New Employees and WatIAM (Peggy Day)
• Web Content Management System (Eva Grabinski)
• Using Winmagic to Encrypt laptops and memory sticks (Jason Testart)
• Checking for Old Software using Secunia CSI Enterprise (Jason Testart)
• New Imaging Process (Rob Yawney)
• Exchange Calendar Implementation Plans (Bob Hicks)
• Microsoft Campus Agreement (Sandra Laughlin)
• Getting Ready for Desktop Rollover in September (Bob Hicks)
• Office 2010 (Bob Hicks)
• Lynda.com web-based training (Bob Hicks)
• New IST Services Page (Bob Hicks

Minutes:

It is important to keep the computing support rep contact sheet up-to-date. A request from someone in an academic support department not listed in the contact sheet will not be acted upon.

Peggy reviewed the process to add a new employee to WatIAM.

Eva provide an update about the Web Content Management System project.

At the last meeting Jason Testart talked about the importance of encrypting the hard disk on laptops that contain sensitive data. Winmagic has been purchased by the University to accomplish this. Jason is documenting the process, and also training IST CHIP staff on how to encrypt a hard drive. The software will be made available to those wishing to do this themselves, and more details about this will be available soon. Laptops purchased through the desktop rollover program will be encrypted with Winmagic.

Jason also talked about using a tool called Secunia, Secunia CSI (Corporate Software Inspector) is software that enumerates what software is installed on each computer and generates reports in terms of criticality of the security vulnerabilities that exist on the installed versions. The lists generated are ordered by level of criticality so we know what our priorities should be. Right now, we (CSS + ITS) are working on getting a CSI agent installed on all computers in the ADS domain.

Rob Yawney talked about the new process to image workstations. The process is much faster than it used to be as the image is installed from a memory stick.

Bookit is going to be replaced by Exchange Calendar in November 2010. The reason for this is Oracle is no longer supporting Oracle Calendar (Bookit). The next steps are to move exisiting Exchange 2007 clients to Exchange 2010 (June, July, August). Training for Exchange Calendar will be offered in late September, October and November. Bookit will be removed sometime in November, probably a couple of weeks after Exhange Calendar is in production.

Sanra Laughlin reviewed the new Microsoft Campus agreement. Those wishing to purchase Windows 7 or Office 2007 should wait until the agreement is finalized and the software is available. This should happen early in July. More information.

Bob Hicks talked about the desktop rollover program. The program is resuming in September, after the IOI 2010 programming contest. Departments were asked to email their list of FTE staff who are currently using a Dell GX620 computer to Bob Hicks. To date, about 150 computers of the 400 computers are on the list to be replaced in academic support departments. The plan is to deploy the new rollover computers with Windows 7. Bob asked that departments test their special purpose apps and the UW corporate apps they use before receiving a Windows 7 workstation. There are Windows 7 issues and IE 8 issues (Windows 7 comes with IE 8). Departments can use a Windows 7 laptop from the CHIP to test Windows 7 by contacting Peggy Day.

Bob talked about the Office 2010 Investigation project. Normally IST skips a version of Office (deployed Office 2002, skipped Office 2003, deployed Office 2007). Because Office 2010 will be free for all faculties/departments on campus (part of the Microsoft campus agreement), it is anticipated that Office 2010 will be used. Also, Office 2010 is tied to another project, SharePoint 2010.

The web based training (Lynda.com), has been popular. The training offers more than 700 courses. More information. OHD also has 5 Lynda.com accounts, in case all the IST accounts are being used.

IST has new Services page. This is a service catalogue for IST. Next step is to establish "expected time of arrival" for services offered by IST.

The next meeting will be held in the Fall 2010 term.