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August 20, 2008
Bookstore Printing Problems Persist
Well, the Formspath printing problems we first encountered at least a month ago have partly been solved, and partly mutated into about six (that's an exaggeration) different problem areas. Yesterday, I think the finishing touches were put on our job schedule to correctly allow for a successful Formspath restart following an IPL (reboot). Unlike most servers, the MBS server is IPL'ed every week. This requires that a number of "services" be restarted on a regular basis.
Now we can at least print PO's, they just look crummy. So, we are attempting to modify the Formspath setup and the new printer setup to make the PO's acceptable. One permutation that might be taken care of was our logo image. The one Formspath was using was terrible - bad resolution and fuzzy. I replaced that image with a better one, but don't know yet if that was successful or not.
As part of the credit card security requirements, we're having to move our controller into a locked area. This is probably a good idea. The actual move should be pretty easy with a little help from our friends in Telcom. There is one rather obnoxious problem - modem noise. We authenticate credit cards over a modem, and they make that little modem noise while dialing and connecting. Once we get the controller into a smaller, yet occupied, space, it will drive someone crazy. Unfortunately, these modems we get from MBS don't have volume controls, nor do they understand DOS AT commands. Kind of takes you back, doesn't it??
Posted by rossm at 9:10 AM | Comments (0)
Oracle Database Recovery
I am still waiting on some root level file structure modifications and some file copying on Maverick in order to try a recovery. Brad has been gone and busy on other stuff, so hasn't gotten to this one yet. Dale and I are pretty much stuck until we can get our server set up to mimmick the Aero configuration. Once that gets done, we hope to make some gains in our knowledge of database backup and recovery. More on this later.
Posted by rossm at 9:06 AM | Comments (0)
Report Modifications, Room Configuration, Server Rebuild, and User Permissions
This week we pushed Astra ahead some more by looking over report modifications and modifying user permissions. I had cut back user permissions to prevent issues such as random buildings going offline for no apparent reason, however, some of those needed to be relaxed to allow certain users to modify events. Additionally, I have been looking at some of the computer labs to make sure we don't schedule events into our open student labs without the lab manager's OK first.
As you know, our server got hacked into a while back. We've cleaned that mess up, but we continue to see some weird behavior which we believe is still connected to the break-in. Brian wants to rebuild the server entirely, and I think that's a great idea. So I've been collecting information about the process for re-installing Astra on the server. It isn't as bad as I first thought, but of course will take some doing.
By the way, it looks like Astra version 7.2 will be available soon. This is a completely web based version that we intend to install when it's available. Ah, job security! Overall, things are going pretty smoothly in the Astra world this week.
Posted by rossm at 8:54 AM | Comments (0)
August 13, 2008
Astra Is Taking Off!
Astra will soon be a household word here on campus, and we are working on the configuration to make it work. It is a mind boggling undertaking - just think about it for a minute - every class and every event scheduled all across campus will be handled by Astra. Working on this project has really opened my eyes to the wide variety of offerings we have. A couple thousand classes here and there, at least as many events being scheduled - this is a happening place! Of course a project this huge does not go smoothly all the time, but I am so thankful to have had the opportunity to work with some truly excellent folks that have helped a LOT.
The nitty gritty details for this week involved me "cracking" the JSP pages and making some very desirable changes to the Astraweb. These changes will make the processing of event requests much easier. Such things as added directions, default values in certain select boxes, and other modifications have been accomplished. Still to go is the assignment of "persons to be notified" for each room and each room configuration. This means telling Astra whom to notify when an event request comes in for a particular room.
Let me give you a bird's eye view of the way events will be requested. First, a person wanting to schedule an event goes to the Astraweb. They fill in all the particulars of their event - name, date, duration, how many will attend, etc. Astra will display a complete list of rooms that are available for this event. You select the room that looks good to you, and press the "Request Event" button. Astra will then send a notification to the person in charge of the room you have requested and create a tentative event (this is BIG! - the tentative event is put on the system automatically). If the event request looks good to the room custodian, then they approve the event. At this point, all events will go to Nan Lehto, who will add in such things as setup and takedown time, resource requirements (chairs, media equipment and such), and confirm the event. Voila, the event is now scheduled and a notice to that effect is sent to the requesting person. Of course, there are a million other considerations such as billing, notification to public safety, and conflicts, but this gives you a good overview of how the system will work. The great advantages of Astra are that the event requests are for rooms that are actually available, and that you can look either in Astra or on Astraweb and see EVERYTHING that is scheduled. This is a case where the added technology of Astra actually will improve our campus. Can't go wrong there!
Posted by rossm at 9:20 AM | Comments (0)
This Week!
OK, so I have been staying up late watching the Olympics. This puts me in a ranting mood for sure. But what is going on around here? Monday was spent unravelling wires over at the Bookstore, and moving equipment around to accommodate their new setup. It was fun, but unscheduled, and took all day. In the end we had unravelled and removed a ton of wires, and it really did look nice. EM was out to lunch on Aero - our server decided to croak over the weekend - again. Just had to restart the emconsole. No problem, there's always Tuesday to catch up, right? Wrong! Another HVAC server got hacked into, the Mailroom computer was not happy with the printer install, and I don't know what else - Tuesday morning was also shot! Today Dale is going to put the hacked server back online.
It's not all bad, the databases are idling along - not much usage on them these days, the air conditioning works, and I've got a good supply of coffee. Anyway, some weeks you run full speed just to get back to where you were the week before - this appears to be one of those weeks!
Posted by rossm at 9:11 AM | Comments (0)
August 6, 2008
Astra - How It's Going
Astra Schedule is going great guns these days. We're just getting ready to activate a new term - Winter '09 so the classroom schedulers can get that ready to go. There is a fair amount of maintenance work required to make sure that the room information across campus remains accurate. We are still identifying certain areas, a lot of them "outside", and such things as new smart classrooms are continually being added. Last week I helped Michael Ellis set up the residence halls and Valsetz areas in Astra. This will enable the folks in those areas to also use Astra for scheduling their activities.
Later this week we're meeting to review the Astraweb configuration. We will be making modifications to this area so that the entire campus will be using Astraweb for requesting events. It should make all aspects of scheduling easier on everyone. The original goals for Astra were to reduce double booking of spaces, and to get information out to folks like the Physical Plant and Public Safety so they are aware of events that require their services. Astraweb will be the last piece that needs to be in place to enable this communication.
A couple of housekeeping chores also needed to be done with Astra. This included removing and re-installing one building - it just didn't "take" when it was created; working on some customized forms; and re-creating some users to enable them to modify certain events.
This is one BIG project! I've met more people across campus while working on this than anything else that's come my way since starting here 10 years ago. It is a really neat application, and I expect it to greatly benefit the entire campus in the future. It is just so much easier to schedule things when you can go to only one place to see what is or is not available.
Posted by rossm at 11:03 AM | Comments (0)
Bookstore Madness Continues
Two items have been plaguing the bookstore for about a month now. Although they aren't real critical problems, they certainly are annoying. Our MBS Forms Path printing software which allows us to print out such useful items as PO's continues to be on the fritz. I've pretty much exhausted the support lines, and Mark has now gotten some higher management at MBS involved to get this software to work. One really annoying piece is that this was supposedly installed and activated by MBS over a year ago, but really wasn't. They just allowed us to pay for it, but never did complete the install. There is some problem in the coding of the software that just refuses to print our forms correctly. I would have to say this has moved from a nuisance to a full blown PITA. MBS support did at least show me how to restart this software when it fails, so one tiny step forward.
The second problem has been with the routine process of cleaning the tape drive heads. There is a special dry process tape we keep on hand, and about every 10 days the drive tells you it needs to be cleaned. You put the cleaning tape into the drive and it takes about a minute to do it's thing. The cleaning tape is good for 50 cleanings, then you get a new one. Well, about a month ago the drive began ejecting the cleaning tape after only a few seconds. The tape had only been used for about 5 uses, so we sent it back to Boise Cascade as defective. They sent us another tape - this replacement tape had a very suspicious rattle - and, sure enough same result. Put it in, out it comes, no head cleaning accomplished. Send it back, get another tape (another one with suspicious rattle), same thing. OK, maybe the tape drive itself is defective. No, wait, every night it faithfully performs our system backup with no errors, so the drive must be working. FIFTH TAPE - same thing! Time to call hardware support at MBS. They had a good piece of advice - call IBM. After much telephone work (mostly waiting on hold - that kind of thing), Rich comes on the phone. No joke, Rich actually knew what he was talking about! He had me read the manufacture lot number off of the cleaning tape, and sure enough - bad manufacturing lot! Rich sent me a good tape overnight, and voila, it worked! I don't know how many of those tapes Boise Cascade has, but we would have had to go through all of them to get a good one! It reminds me of the saying "Tempest in a teapot". Much to do about a simple tape cleaning process!
I have to say it is a sad time at the bookstore for another reason - Kris Adams no longer works there. She has been transferred to the Financial Aid office. Kris was my "go to" person for technical stuff at the bookstore and the two of us have solved many an MBS riddle over the years. Kris, I wish you all the best in your new position! It truly won't be the same there without you.
Posted by rossm at 9:16 AM | Comments (0)
New 10gR2 Instance
Hello again, blogging world. I've been out enjoying the Summer and taking vacation, but am now back for a few weeks to move things forward. The latest news on Oracle databases is that I installed a brand new instance of 10gR2 on our standy/backup server. I've been reading up on RMAN and am just about ready to try to load this database from the backups of our production instance. Brad is going to copy over the backup folders for me and do a little work recreating the correct directory structure, then we'll be ready to give it a try. This is really the first "restore" we've tried around here for quite a while. It is the first step in creating a more robust backup strategy, and also the first step in getting us trained and ready to perform backups if it becomes necessary.
The two production databases have been pretty boring lately. They are getting light usage this time of year. The smaller one has a few issues with the server it's on, but there is a light at the end of the tunnel. We may very well have a VM (virtual machine) to put it on in the near future. Everyone is ready for that to happen. Dale and I continue to monitor these databases using EM, and have fixed some minor problems. We are both impressed with the improvements in Version2 over Version1.
Posted by rossm at 9:01 AM | Comments (0)