Operational Meeting

These were accepted as a reasonable account of the last meeting.

Actions discussed:

• Review pages in computing.help

  Amend action to cover all pages last reviewed in 2015 with a completion date of end of September. check here.

• On-line exams and EdLAN issues

  George/Tim to arrange meeting with a view to testing out in AT labs before they are returned to Service.

Actions deferred:

• September: Look at logging all Apache logs centrally

Blog articles suggested:

• None

Report from Computing Executive Group

• CCPAG verbal report
  • Supported MacOS environment now being piloted - documentation available. A project has been created for us to look into using this.
  • Windows 10 - possible delay due to a timing issue.
  • Web strategy - technical audit of web 'estate' - report to be produced by end of July, covering static websites only (not apps over the web). We haven't as yet been audited.
  • IS have around 50K allocation for network improvements. George has written up two potential cases and passed them to Alastair, who has subsequently submitted them.
  • Cloud services - Eleanor is run by ECDF and is for research use. The new hopper service is run by IS ITI and is intended for developers and student projects and will be available from the end of July. We should ensure our documentation is updated and promote this service.
  • Functional accounts tidy up - IS Apps are creating an API to help with this which has caused a delay. They have been asked to circulate a spreadsheet of the existing accounts.
  • Office365 - one person mentioned that they have started using a web client due to issues with IMAP. Stephen noted that he had heard of others who have done the same.
  • Register of services - Colin has thrown extra resources at the project.
• UniForum

  The aim is to categorise support activities across Universities as part of the 'Service Excellence' program. Alastair has gathered figures for the 15/16 Academic year and mapped them to the list of categories provided. This will continue for the next 4 years but there will need to be further discussion to standardise the interpretation of the categories as Schools may currently interpret them differently.

• Network review

  Ian asked if there was any update on the network review being carried out by the University. Alastair noted that there was nothing concrete to report. It is hoped, however, that our 'core' switches will be replaced as part of this project.

Reports from Units

• Infrastructure

  1. Forum server room gas supression system
  2. Forum server room UPS
  3. New kit
  4. SL7 upgrades
  5. core3
  6. Nagios profile breakage
  7. Serial console issue
  8. General reminders
     • Please unplug and return screens/mice/keyboards to trolleys when finished
     • Please return label machine promptly
     • Please don't just plug things into switches without configuring the ports.

• Managed Platform

  • SL7.3 for desktops

    All desktop machines which are on SL7.2 will be upgraded to SL7.3 overnight after the stable release on Wednesday 21st June.

  • Oversized VMs

    Before making a new VM, please work out how much disk space it will really need and size your partitions appropriately.

  • Sleep and time on desktops
  • VirtualBox update
  • Recent meetings

• Research and Teaching

  1. PostgreSQL 10 beta
  2. SL7 Server progress
     
  3. marzipan and hardware failure/migration

• Services

  1. Disk failure news
  2. DB mailman list failure

     Stephen suggested it might be better to use keytab rather than risk public keys getting lost when a replacement machine is brought into service.

  3. New backup server
  4. SL7 progress

• User Support

  • Return to AT
  • CSO post
  • SL7 server upgrades

Topics for discussion

None

AOCB

The next meeting will be on Wednesday 28th June at 10:00, in IF-4.31, chaired by Alison.