Website Performance: Pressflow, Varnish, Oh-My!

Executive summary:
We’ve migrated from core Drupal-6 to Pressflow, a back-port of Drupal-7 performance features. Using Pressflow allows us to cache anonymous web-requests (about 77% of our traffic) for 5-minutes and return them right from memory. While this vastly improves the amount of traffic we can handle as well as the speed of anonymous page-loads it […]…Continue Reading Website Performance: Pressflow, Varnish, Oh-My!

Revisiting Earlier “Specter-lations” on the Eve of the Pennsylvania Senate Primary

One advantage political scientists have over the media or pundits is that we have the luxury of revisiting earlier projections/explanations in light of new data or theorizing.  This is an advantage when writing a blog that tries to focus on the fundamentals driving political events rather than simply opining on the latest topical event.  In […]…Continue Reading Revisiting Earlier “Specter-lations” on the Eve of the Pennsylvania Senate Primary

NITLE Camp 2010

This came in today from NITLE; for those who are still planning out their professional development plans, this might be of interest.
– mike
I invite you to take a look at the Camp schedule and consider how you might use these offerings to advance your campus’s mission. At this year’s NITLE Summit we tackled the theme “Advancing towards […]…Continue Reading NITLE Camp 2010

May all-LIS staff meeting agenda

LIS May Staff Meeting Agenda
We have a staff meeting on Wednesday May 19th from 3-4PM in the Harman Reading Room. Here’s the agenda:
1. Announcements
2. Strategic Planning Website
https://sites.google.com/a/middlebury.edu/lis-strategic-planning/
3. Assessment and Re-accreditation
https://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AYZPHKugPdOiZGNzdDV0aDNfMjVnNnpma2ZmMg&hl=en
4. Introduction of New Teams: Space, Security, Training & Education
http://www.middlebury.edu/offices/technology/lis/about/teams
We’ll have coffee available at 2:45.
– mike…Continue Reading May all-LIS staff meeting agenda

Technology Helpdesk Relocation

Come Monday May 17 the LIS Technology Helpdesk will be relocating from LIB135 to LIB125.  Our actual move of Helpdesk functions will begin Friday May 14 at 3:00pm.  While the Helpdesk functions are being relocated to LIB125 the Helpdesk Student Consultants located at our Walk-In Helpdesk Center in LIB202 will be open for business to receive calls […]…Continue Reading Technology Helpdesk Relocation

Sunday Downtime Notice for May 13, 2010

LIS will occasionally perform maintenance on systems during a scheduled window of Sunday 8AM-10AM EST. The following systems may not be available during that time this Sunday, May 13, 2010. If you have questions or concerns, please contact the Helpdesk at helpdesk@middlebury.edu or (802) 443-2200.

Museum of Art website
Undergraduate Research […]…Continue Reading Sunday Downtime Notice for May 13, 2010

Middlebury Trailrunner

I’ve just posted a case study to the Teaching with Technology blog.  Jeff Byers, Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry, created his Middlebury Trailrunner blog as a community resource for like-minded runners.  Running is just a hobby for Jeff, but the technology behind the project has potential curricular applications from biology to environmental […]…Continue Reading Middlebury Trailrunner