August 18, 2011
10.3g Upgrade Completed + A Few Other Things
I came in early this morning to perform the RecTrac upgrade from10.3f to 10.3g with assistance from RT support - Zach. Everything seems to have completed normally, so we are now on the latest greatest RT version - at least for this week. Seems like they are pushing out a lot of upgrades. Maggi informed me that this upgrade did fix some issues we were having with our access control.
Tomorrow afternoon Gabe and I are scheduled to take down all the front desk workstations and other equipment. The front desk is being fixed over the weekend. First thing Monday morning we'll be putting it all back together again. I am also hoping to uninstall/reinstall the RT clients on all those workstations, which might clear up an issue we've been having where the wrong image is displayed for a person going through the access control points.
Final thing - Christina is preparing for the big Fall student import - sync'ing up Banner and RT is no easy thing. We're also looking to put more images onto the RT server, but not until the new student id cards have been created.
There are still some things about RT that aren't quite right, however, it seems to me that with each upgrade we have fixed more outstanding issues. It is getting better and better.
Posted by rossm at 10:06 AM | Comments (0)
July 26, 2011
RecTrac Upgrade Scheduled for Wednesday AM
A new version of RecTrac - 10.3(f) is available and has been scheduled for installation Wednesday morning. This newer version promises better performance with the community card encoding, which has not been working too well for us. Hopefully, this will help us move forward in solving that problem. The last upgrade totally wiped out our whole system, so this one has been scheduled during working hours.
Posted by rossm at 8:02 AM | Comments (0)
April 14, 2011
Update on the HWC
The HWC building is up and running, and it is a really nice facility. The access control is working well, and the HWC staff are becoming more familiar with RecTrac. So, the big picture is very positive.
However, we do continue to be plagued with a fairly large quantity of smaller, irritating problems. Adam is still doing battle with the card encoders - they have all decided to quit encoding cards. The printers were giving us some trouble, but the staff have been provided directions on how to install the card printer to their individual logins - the shared printer wants to be installed on a per-user basis, sheesh. We are still awaiting hardware to split the video from WS#4 to the East and West desk secondary monitors. This will permit easier monitoring of the access control for staff.
Rip discovered an interesting bug in RecTrac when attempting to print an ID card for a non-Banner user. RT displays the wrong image when assembling the data to print on the card. The card actually prints OK, so this is just a random bit of weirdness.
There are a few individuals who are having a difficult time using the fingerprint access. There aren't any adjustments, but some fingers just don't want to print. A very few unlucky persons have had problems with both the fingerprint and their ID card.
Adam and I need to gather together faculty/staff images to import into RT, plus we can grab newer student images, too.
The one minute and nightly feeds seem to be working quite well. It is very cool to watch someone purchase a pass from Wolf Web, and by the time they are looked up in RT, their household has been created, with a vaild pass, and including any family members for which passes were purchased.
The OpenEdge database crashed last week, causing about 4 hours of down time. The cause is unknown.
A little over 35,000 log entries were removed from the RT server - the one minute process dumps a log file every time it runs. The plan is to create an OS script to delete the files automatically - right now they must be deleted by hand.
DB backups are being made by hand right now. The scheduled backups run, but don't create a backup file. Working on a solution for this with Zach - it is an RT bug.
Version 10.3D update is available soon. We will be upgrading to this version (we are at 10.3C) when it becomes available.
There's more, but this gives you a good idea of the current status of things at the HWC. The climbing wall trainings are now available, and some persons are now certified to climb. Racquetball equipment is available for rental. Lots happening at the HWC!
Posted by rossm at 8:36 AM | Comments (0)
March 31, 2011
The Health and Wellness Center
Once again, I see the blog has gotten away from me. Well, the new HWC - Health and Wellness Center has been a big project over the past 3-6 months. This is a good time to review some of the issues, how they were resolved, and the current status of the HWC from a Sysadmin point of view.
The software purchased to assist in the functioning of the HWC is called RecTrac. RecTrac is a very large, widely used application that performs tasks such as Access Control, Locker Rental, Intramural Leagues, Activities (aerobics classes, first aid classes for example), Equipment Rentals and many other tasks associated with a Rec Center.
In our particular situation, we needed RecTrac to monitor those who are permitted to use the facility (students and paid faculty/staff/dependents), and to control the access turnstiles/gates. This proved to be a complicated, Class IV problem. The system now has two feeds from Banner - a "One Mintue" and a "Nightly" feed. These interfaces keep the information current as to who is/is not eligible to enter the facility. There is also an application written by Christina Robb which allows staff, faculty, and students to purchase passes to the HWC by using Wolf Web - very similar to purchasing parking stickers.
Another major undertaking was ID card encoding. All student ID cards plus ID cards of faculty/staff who pay to use the facility had to be encoded. We needed to be able to create dependent ID cards as well. This resulted in a campus-wide restructuring of the card encoding process. Adam Wehner did a lot of the heavy lifting on that project.
So, at this time, most student ID cards have been encoded to allow them access to the HWC by swiping their card at the entry gate. Many students have also had their fingerprint "registered" with RecTrac and can gain access to the facility or rent equipment with a finger scan (cool? Yes!!).
For the remainder of this week faculty and staff can tour or use the facility for free. After that, a pass must be purchased prior to entering the HWC facility. A note: The access control applies only to the pool/workout/climbing wall/gym/locker room area of the building. Persons can attend classes, which are in the public side of the building, without going through the access control points by using the West entrance and making a sharp right before getting to the front desk.
In the future I will break down some of the more specific solutions and key pieces that make it all run.
Posted by rossm at 1:10 PM | Comments (0)