Around Campus
We brought cheer to campus with our flower-inspired attire on our first Floral Friday on August 28!
Pictured: Mario Ivanov, Jane Kovach, Sean Rumsby, Blair Brooks, Brandt Linkowski, Heather Fraser, Vincent Connor
The Computer Help Desk will be participating in new student orientations and the President’s BBQ in September to welcome new students and introduce them to University Systems.
The University is in the process of transitioning payment card services from Beanstream to Moneris, including new pin pads at checkouts, new online hosted payment pages, and new online virtual terminals. A number of units have been transitioned during the month of August, including but not limited to ONECard, Food Services and the Office of the Registrar, with the remaining units to be transitioned in the month of September. DSS staff helped with the deployment of Moneris debit terminals in many of our supported departments on campus and have now configured and deployed over 50 new debit terminals across campus!
DSS staff supporting University Food Services (UNFS) have been busy updating menu information and creating new menus for the new Food Services outlets on campus. This work is in preparation for the start of the fall term and the launch of the new food outlets in Mystic Market and CARSA building in September.
CALL will be reopening in CLE A051 in early September. Following a minor flood over the Summer, CALL has been freshly renovated and is ready to provide language learning facilities for our students starting in September.
Accomplishments
The Blackboard Transact system which underpins the ONECard program was upgraded in the month of August. This upgrade fixed some bugs, but also brings new functional capabilities, such as support for WiFi door locks, whereby the previous version only supported wired door locks. Support for WiFi door locks substantially increases the number of potential doors that can be outfitted with ONECard access, as wired door locks are generally only feasible to install during new construction or substantial renovations of existing space.
The Computer Help Desk has been busy preparing for the September semester. New computers have been deployed in our facilities, a number of workstations have been upgraded to Windows 8.1, and new printers have been installed to provide our students with a reliable, modern computing environment.
A new online waiver system for Athletics and Recreation Services (ATRS) went live in August (PC0496). Previously, patrons of CARSA and other ATRS programs were required to sign paper waivers prior to participating, which was inconvenient and error-prone. The new online system enables patrons to electronically view and sign waivers anytime, anywhere in MyPage. Desktop Support Services (DSS) staff worked with Production and Technical Support (PTS) to modify the CLASS Recreation Management system in ATRS to implement this new waiver system. This was required for the Athletics Online Waivers project .
The online admissions system was upgraded to allow special programs to ask supplementary questions as part of the central admissions process. Previously departments offering special programs had to reach out to students independent of the central admissions process to obtain qualifying information specific to their program, which led to processing inefficiencies and a poor experience for students.
The CourseSpaces Learning Management System (LMS) was upgraded during the month of August. This upgrade was required to maintain technical currency of the underlying Moodle platform, and also to install a number of useful plug-ins required for enhanced functionality, such as the ability for instructors to administer quizzes.
The Cooperative Education and Career Services (COOP) Computer Refresh project (PC0507) has been completed. This project replaced 32 Macintosh desktops and 6 Macintosh laptops with new standard PC desktops and laptops from the Technology Solutions Centre (TSC). This ensures the new computers meet the current technology standards defined by the University including support for TPM whole disk encryption and provide a more stable, secure, and supportable environment.
Project Progress
Since September 2014, we have opened 104 projects, closed 72, and had an average of 93 projects open. In the last week of August 2014 we had 94 projects open, in the last week of August 2015 we had 117 projects open! We have been busy this summer!
The performance gym in CARSA will need to be provisioned for enhanced wireless (PC0517). A consultant is working with our Network Services team to produce design recommendations for review.
Connect onboarding for the University of Victoria Senate and Board of Governors (PC0567, PC0568) is now underway. The project team is performing content analysis and clean-up in preparation for content population in the new sites.
The instructional technology in all four of the Classroom Infrastructure Project (CIP) rooms has been installed and the Classroom Infrastructure Committee has toured the new rooms (PC0511).