University Systems News for February 2016

Around Campus

Have you ever been curious to know what it’s like to work for our Audio Visual Services team? A few months ago, the team put together a fun “Day in the Life” video that is available through our Video on Demand (VOD) service. Enjoy!

The inaugural Enhanced Planning Tools reporting period ended on February 15.   This tool, which went live in November, has created a user-friendly toolkit that can be easily accessed by all units, to aid them with their existing planning processes. The goal of these tools, together with current planning processes, is to help maintain the quality of the education and research programs at UVic, by providing units with financial and student data associated with their units, asking units to answer a list of questions and criteria from the Enhanced Planning Committees. The technical team is working on a number of functionality enhancements for the next reporting period, which will begin later this year.

We webcast Drought-related tree mortality: Heading into a century of more frequent and severe forest dieback events, by Dr. Robbie Andrew Hember on February 17, 2016. More information about this event and the webcast can be found on the PICS website.

The Nursing CIHI Terminal Server Project (PC0591) is nearing completion. The purpose of this project was to create a secure terminal server to host data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) and install statistical software for researchers in the School of Nursing to perform analysis on the data. As the data is confidential, security is paramount to the project.

The BCom Case Competition Tablet Project (PC0599) was written and approved by the Project Review Committee.  This project will replace the technology used by Gustavson students in the RBC case competitions – currently overhead projectors – with Microsoft Surface tablets.

Stay Connected

The Connect Help team are working on the much anticipated online training module for Connect Level One: Basic Training. Can’t wait for the online training course? Sign-up for in-person training is available on the Connect Training site. Level Two: Customization and Level Three: Site Creation and Permissions are available in-person and online.

Skye has been cleaning up the bulletin boards in the C-wing hallway and break room. If you have any ideas or suggestions for content, please contact Skye at swilk@uvic.ca.

skye

Computing Standards

New desktop standards have been selected at the Technology Solutions Centre: the Dell Optiplex 3040 SFF, Dell Optiplex 3040 Micro, and Dell Optiplex 5040MT. Curious to know more about how our campus computing standards are selected? Check out the TSC website and iTSC blog!

Client Technologies has created new TSC standard images for Windows 7, Windows 8.1, and Windows 10 installations. Hardware-specific images were created for the new desktop standards named above.

Media Services

The requirements collection and RFP draft have been created to implement new classrooms and remote courtroom technology in the Law Faculty Moot Court.

Media Services has attended teleprompter training provided by University Communications + Marketing. The team practiced setting up the teleprompter as well using the iPad teleprompter application. Neat!

Project Management

Fiscal Year End is looming and Trish is consulting with Project Managers to ensure that final budget stages are successfully completed on time. If you have a project with costs and/or recoveries that is due to close soon, please contact the General Office as soon as possible.

During the lifetime of a project, the Sponsor acts as the champion for the requirements and resources to deliver the end product or service. To ensure the success and championship of the resulting product or service beyond the project, we are now identifying the Administrative Authority as part of the project planning process in the Project Plan template. As defined in UVic Policy IM7800, Administrative Authority means individuals with administrative responsibility for units (e.g., Vice-Presidents, Chief Information Officer, Executive Directors, Deans, Chairs, Directors and other unit heads) and individuals with functional stewardship of university Information Resources.

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