August 11, 2014

Today's topics:

Getting notifications of outages

While we strive to notify people of changes to computing in this newsletter, sometimes services fail or unscheduled changes must be made. In that case, there are two main methods to be notified:

1. The NetworkStatus wiki page - https://wiki.classe.cornell.edu/Computing/NetworkStatus
   • We update this page when possible as outages are known and ongoing.
2. For more timely notifications than checking a wiki page, you can subscribe to the CLASSE-IT-NEWS-L list.
   • This is OPT-IN, you must choose to subscribe. See https://wiki.classe.cornell.edu/Computing/ClasseNews
   • NEW!: If you want to be notified by text (on a best-effort basis) you can submit a service request to have your cell phone subscribed to the list. You will get at least the headline / subject as a text message. We will need your cell phone number and carrier (Verizon, AT&T ...).

MATLAB license upgrade on CLASSE Managed Windows computers during normally scheduled updates

This week's update for CLASSE Managed Windows systems will include a transparent upgrade of the MATLAB license configuration for the currently supported Matlab 2013a version. Active MATLAB jobs will not be affected by the change. If you are running a different version, this would be a good time to upgrade to Matlab 2013a. It would also be a good idea to consider using the new CLASSE GRID.exe to run Matlab remotely on our compute farm if possible. Please contact us with any questions or concerns.

Wilson computer room AC upgrade, Aug 4-13

The main cooling unit in the Wilson computer room (W221) will be replaced August 4-13. During this time, we will be selectively shutting down non-critical systems to reduce the heat load. If the heat load becomes unmanageable, we may need to shut down systems more aggressively, in which case users may observe some degradation of central services. Outages will be announced via lab-wide emails. Wilson #229 (The Help Desk), will be unoccupied until later this week.

Computer group away schedule

While we ask that service requests be sent to the whole computer group at service-classe@cornell.edu (or via the web form), it is sometimes useful to know which computer group members are out of town on any given day. For that purpose, please refer to the computer group's away schedule at https://wiki.classe.cornell.edu/Computing/CmpGrp/Obsolete/HelmkeAwaySchedule.

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General network and server maintenance will occur every Tuesday from 12:00 noon to 2:00 PM. The CLASSE-IT group will always announce any expected disruptions in our NewsLetter and via CLASSE-IT-NEWS-L, but with the size and complexity of our network there is always the potential for something to go wrong. We will do our best to contain all network maintenance and planned outages to Tuesdays from 12:00 noon to 2:00 PM.

Unless other arrangements have been made, CLASSE-managed Windows systems may be updated and rebooted on Tuesday morning at 2:00 AM, so please avoid critical or lengthy operations at that time. For more details, please see SystemExpectations.

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Questions or problems? Submit a service request.

Other resources:

• CLASSE IT Home Page
• Previous newsletters

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