Notice of Network upgrade & planned outage:
Dear colleagues,
Since this planned network maintenance affects everyone, we want to give you an advance head’s up on what will be happening so your area can let us know of any complications that we may have missed or make alternate arrangements during the outage periods that will take place this Sunday August 19th.
When:
We will perform this work on Sunday, August 19, beginning at 6:00am – approx. 12:00 noon EST. There will be (2) 15-20 minute network outage periods. The first will occur at approx. 6:15am, the second sometime between 9-11am, with a 15min notification preceding the outage.
How this affects you:
During the two brief 15 min intervals when we are switching core function from the primary network core to the replacement network core, and back from the replacement core to the primary, nobody on or off campus will have access to network services (this means all systems will be unavailable – Email, Banner, middfiles, everything including our websites middlebury.edu & miis.edu.) The Snow Bowl will also have no phone service during the 15 min intervals.
In addition, during the entire maintenance period (6am – approx. noon), network performance may be slower than normal as we will be running on a temporary network setup while we perform the work.
What & Why:
Network core routing functionality and high-speed connectivity for our campus internet is provided by a pair of routing switches, one in Voter, the other in the Library. Currently these two switches function independently, with no overlap or redundancy in their function. Any particular sub-network is routed on a single switch. Any campus building is ultimately connected to the rest of the campus internet at a single switch. Thus a failure of either switch would cause a total loss of network connectivity for a significant portion of the campus, even if the other switch were working.
This project will improve our redundancy and network availability by eliminating either switch as a “single point of failure” adding redundant links in a way that the functions currently provided only by the Voter switch can be duplicated by the Library’s and reduce risk of a total loss of connectivity.
If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us.
Regards,
Helpdesk@middlebury.edu
X2200