Sunday Morning Maintenance

On Sunday, February 24th, during downtime we will be changing the url of our WordPress instance from “sites.middlebury.edu” to “sites.middlebury.edu.”

The following message was sent to WordPress site owners on Thursday, the 22nd:

Thank you to everyone who participated in our survey on the change from “blogs” to “sites.”

On Sunday, February 24th, during downtime we will be changing the url of our WordPress instance from “sites.middlebury.edu” to “sites.middlebury.edu.”

What you need to do: NOTHING
This change only affects the url in the address bar of a browser, you do not need to move any content in your site.

Will your links still work? YES
We will be setting up a redirect so that anyone trying to visit a site using “sites.middlebury.edu” will be redirected to “sites.middlebury.edu.”

Can I still track visits to my site using Google Analytics? YES
Last January we made a change to have all Middlebury web applications crawled using one Google Analytic account. You will simply need to add the “sites.middlebury.edu” address in your segments.

Will this change my site or url if I use another address? Like middlab.middlebury.edu or southchinasea.org? NO
Sites that have their own url, their own subdomain, will not be affected by this change.

Please send questions about this change to Joe Antonioli.

Friday Links, Feb. 22, 2013

Got MOOCs?  Here are two recent pieces I found interesting:

The first is from Wired: Beyond the Buzz, Where Are MOOCs Really Going? by Michael Horn and Clayton Christensen.  “We believe they are likely to evolve into a scale business, one that relies on the technology and data backbone of the medium to optimize and individualize learning opportunities for millions of students. This is very different than simply putting a video of a professor lecturing online.”

The second is The Trouble With Online College from the New York Times and takes perhaps a less optimistic view. “Courses delivered solely online may be fine for highly skilled, highly motivated people, but they are inappropriate for struggling students who make up a significant portion of college enrollment and who need close contact with instructors to succeed.”

Re: EDUCAUSE Security Breach

Earlier today, we received notification from EDUCAUSE that they experienced a security breach in early February. We immediately changed our domain administration passwords for miis.edu and middlebury.edu, as recommended by EDUCAUSE. In addition, we have verified that our domain details for miis.edu and middlebury.edu are okay.

Any Middlebury and Monterey users who have an EDUCAUSE account and/or profile should immediately reset their EDUCAUSE passwords  and verify their account information at http://www.educause.edu.

–Chris
PS. If you cannot reach the EDUCAUSE website right now, you might try again in a little while after the initial rush to action has subsided.

Please review the statement from EDUCAUSE below;

February 19, 2013 – Garth Jordan, Vice President, Operations, of EDUCAUSE, issued the following statement with regard to a recent breach of EDUCAUSE servers by an unauthorized third party.

“On February 5th, EDUCAUSE discovered that the server that maintains the .edu domain information and our member profile information was breached. The breach may have compromised .edu domain passwords and information contained in individual EDUCAUSE website profiles, including names, titles, e-mail addresses, usernames, and passwords. Based on our investigation to date, we do not believe the breach included access to credit card data, financial accounts, or other sensitive information.

“EDUCAUSE took immediate steps to contain this breach and we are working with Federal law enforcement, investigators, and security experts to make sure this incident is properly addressed. Additional security measures have been implemented to help prevent any future occurrences.

“As a precaution, we are proceeding as though all individual EDUCAUSE website profiles and all .edu domain holders might have been impacted. We have notified via email all .edu domain holders and all individuals with website profiles about the breach and requested that they change their passwords. All that is required from those impacted by this breach is a password re-set.

“The threat of a breach is a constant business concern; no organization is immune from these illegal and harmful activities. Therefore, our priority remains ensuring the security and privacy of our members, domain holders, and everyone who relies on our services.”

For help with EDUCAUSE website profile password changes, please contact EDUCAUSE Member Services at info@educause.edu or +1-303-449-4430.

Friday Links, Feb. 15, 2013

Play On! Put On a Show Within A Show
This play is hilarious! And it features our very own System Administrator, Mike Lynch! Nice write-up in the Campus, just in time for this weekend’s performances.

Terry Deary’s attack on libraries branded ‘ignorant twaddle’
Popular children’s author Terry Deary says public libraries should cease to exist. Other authors disagree.

The Only Thing That Can Stop This Asteroid Is Your Liberal Arts Degree, from McSweeney’s.

Sunday morning network maintenance

The following essential network maintenance activity is planned for this Sunday morning that will result in extended service interruptions throughout the campus.

Between  6:30 and 7:15 am the network core’s components will be upgraded.  While all of the components of the network core are redundant, not all parts of the network throughout the campus have a path back to both sides of the network core.  As a result there will be a 20 – 30 minute network service interruption for the majority of buildings on campus.

Between 7:00 and 8:15 am critical network aggregation switches that connect campus buildings and server farms to the network core will be upgraded.  This will result in a complete interruption of network connectivity of approximately 30 minutes throughout the campus.  This includes access to the College’s primary web sites, Email, MiddFiles – all systems hosted at Middlebury.

Between 7:45 and 9:00 am our border gateway routers and other components that connect the network core with the Internet will be upgraded.  We expect four 3-5 minute periods where Internet routing will be in flux and expect transient loss of Internet connectivity for the Middlebury campus.  During these four 3-5 minute periods, the VPNs with MIIS and Ellucian may be interrupted briefly, this would impact reaching Banner SSB and INB.

These network upgrades are essential and must be completed in a timely manner.  We appreciate your patience as we strive to keep our network operating optimally.

Liaison Discussion: Curricular resources and projects

Topic: Curricular resources and projects. Led by Joe Antonioli and Adam Franco.
Who’s Invited: All liaisons and anyone who might be interested
Who’s “Required”: Primary liaisons, please try to attend if you can. Sorry in advance for any conflicts.
Where and when: Wednesday, February 20, 10-11 am. LIB 145.

Description:
Joe and Adam will provide an overview of curricular resources and projects, including:
* Course Catalog and Scheduler
* Adding Middfiles to the Course Hub
* Digital Language Lab pilot
* Adaptive Testing

***
“Liaison Discussion Section” meetings address research and/or technology topics of interest to liaisons. They can be conversations, or presentations, or both. They take place most often on the 3rd week of the month, but in order to allow people who work different hours to attend, they’re sometimes scheduled for different days/times.

Open Access Journal PeerJ Publishes First Articles

From Library Journal / The Digital Shift:
“Multidisciplinary Open Access journal publisher PeerJ announced the publication of its first 30 peer-reviewed articles today. Co-founders Jason Hoyt, formerly chief scientist and VP for research and development for Mendeley, and Peter Binfield, formerly publisher of the Public Library Of Science (PLOS), launched PeerJ in June 2012. They quickly garnered support for the project, ultimately assembling an Editorial Board of 800 academics and an advisory board of 20—five of whom are Nobel Laureates…”
Full article.