Category Archives: News

For the most up-to-date system status, please go to https://status.its.unc.edu/

There will be an outage affecting ConnectCarolina and other systems beginning at 5:00pm on Friday, May 17, and ending at approximately 8:00pm on Saturday, May 18.

The first outage is related to the Summer I session Census. Due to the need to “freeze” the database to take the census snapshot, users will not be able to access ConnectCarolina pages beginning at 5:00pm on May 17. All faculty and staff are requested to please log out of ConnectCarolina by 5:00pm on May 17.  Students will NOT be able to use ConnectCarolina for all functions during this time.  

Immediately following the census outage, ITS has a planned maintenance outage, beginning at approximately 11:00pm on Friday, May 17, and ending at approximately 8:00pm on Saturday, May 18.  ConnectCarolina and other applications will be down during this time frame.

During the May 17-18 outage, the following functions may experience limited and/or no functionality:

• ConnectCarolina
• ePro
• Some Guest ID and Onyen update services
• UNC Directory (lookups available, but not updates)
• UNC Online Application (Summer School, Nursing, Part-time Studies, etc.)
• UNC Guest ID creations
• TouchNet (students and third party proxies cannot pay bills; applicants cannot pay enrollment deposits)
• Affiliate
• InDEPTh
• Check Request
• Web Travel
• Web Vendor
• Friday Center Applications (CPPSReg, PDEPReg, CEU, FCCPS)
• EPAWeb (New Hire Actions Only)
• Applicant Web (Employees cannot update their PID under their Applicant Profile)
• HRIS
• FACS II Administration
• PID Create
• PID Inquiry
• ConnectCarolina reporting environment (HRRPT)
• Reporting tools (OBIEE, EPM and WebFocus)
• ImageNow
• Student Stores applications (i.e., ordering textbooks)

We appreciate your cooperation and support as we continue to make ITS applications more efficient for our users.

Questions/Problems:
Help Desk: 919-962-HELP or help.unc.edu

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IT support is available to the UNC-Chapel Hill community 24 hours a day, 365 days a year at 962-HELP and help.unc.edu.

Welcomes

• Wanda Wilson (Enterprise Applications)
• Thao Nghi Bui (Teaching & Learning)
• Ariel Fearrington (User Support & Engagement)
• Christopher “Tyler” Wood (Enterprise Applications)
• Srikanth Marpadga (Enterprise Applications)
• Arpitha Cheekati (Enterprise Applications)
• Santhebachahalli Nagaraj (Enterprise Applications)
• Prakash Gadde (Enterprise Applications)

Goodbyes

• Jeff Merrill (CIO Office)
• Caitlin Swartz (Enterprise Applications)
• Ronnie Rogers, Jr. (User Support & Engagement)
• Michael Robinson (Enterprise Applications)
• Matthew Belski (User Support & Engagement)
• Diego Ramirez (User Support & Engagement)

On June 15th 2012, ITS and its Employee Council took the time to recognize the organization’s Unsung Heroes.  These employees were nominated and chosen by their peers for outstanding contributions to the ITS organization in multiple categories.  ITS management and staff are proud of their achievement and salute all the nominees and winners.  Keep up the good work!
 

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The ConnectCarolina project team, along with the Campus Working Groups (comprised of representatives from across campus), is continuing on the long road to implementation of the Finance and HR/Payroll modules of PeopleSoft. Here is just a brief look at what we are working on.

Finance

• Work is settling into the steady rhythm of development
• The development of Business Processes in the PeopleSoft environment is in process and will also produce the test scenarios for function testing
• A security consultant is on board and busy evaluating the security requirements and crafting our security approach
• The initial prototype of workflow was demonstrated to the Stakeholders May 22; it was well received and has allowed the team to proceed with an important set of implementation guidelines in place
• Discovery work to detail the requirements for modifications and interfaces continues
• Development of functional specifications continues to be a major focus
• Technical Specifications are now in the review process
• Technical design and development is underway on the items with approved functional specifications

Human Resources/Payroll

• Gap documents have been approved by Stakeholders and Sponsors. Gap documents describe the changes needed to PeopleSoft to meet the University’s needs. The goal is to use PeopleSoft “out of the box” as much as possible, keeping modifications to a minimum. Sponsor approval is required for all modifications.
• With the Sponsors and Stakeholders approval, ConnectCarolina business analysts are beginning work on the functional design documents. These documents will take the high level designs presented in gap documents and detail them so they can be reviewed and ultimately coded by the technical team.
• The HR/Payroll project team has completed presentation of the solutions for known system gaps excluding workflow, the annual raise process and a few other smaller topics. Gaps for workflow and the annual raise process will be finalized in the near future as these require a greater depth of analysis to assure a proper solution is identified and implemented.
• Solutions are being prepared for the use of Full Time Equivalent (FTE) at UNC.  The PeopleSoft definition varies some from how it is applied and used at UNC.  The project team is working on delivered solutions for this.
• Discussions with various groups to finalize the decision on the use of Full or Partial Position Management for the University.   Other universities are being queried to see if and how they use Position Management and the advantages and disadvantages to the approach. The topic is expected to be discussed in an upcoming Stakeholder meeting.

Welcome Cesar Lopez to Enterprise Applications, effective Jan. 30 and Shumin Li to Infrastructure and Operations, effective Jan. 30.

Farewell to Val Negri of Enterprise Applications, effective Jan. 25; Kathryn Dempsey, Elizabeth Hicks, Michael Young and Cindy Stone of Enterprise Applications, effective Jan. 30; and Steve Fearrington and Paul “Doug” McIntyre of Infrastructure and Operations, effective Jan. 30.

Patrick Kiernan, User Support and Engagement

“I would like to recognize Patrick Kiernan for the ‘extra miles’ he went in order to assist a customer. The customer had checked in her computer with the ITRC for some work. She did not mention that she was leaving the country at noon on Saturday to spend the semester studying abroad. On Friday evening after 9 p.m., she called the ITRC to see about picking up her computer. Unfortunately, the Walk-In closes at 5 p.m. on Fridays.

Upon learning about the situation, Patrick volunteered to contact the customer and arrange a time to meet her. At 10:30 p.m. that night, he drove to campus to get her computer, make sure she had the software she needed, and return the computer to her. Patrick’s efforts were certainly beyond expectations and a good example of his dedication to customer service.” Matt Howell, User Support and Engagement

Computer operating system (OS) providers generally issue OS patches on a monthly basis, though urgent critical updates are released in addition to and sometimes out of cycle with the standard patches. Rebooting your computer(s) is an important step in applying these patches.

After a patch is installed, a reboot is required before future patches can be applied. Most patches will also not be ‘active’ until the reboot. You will be prompted to reboot (if nobody is logged on, then reboot is automatic). If you power down at the end of the day, that is the same as a reboot and is sufficient. Again, if you don’t reboot or power down at some point after a patch is installed, then future patches won’t be installed and your computer will not be secure!

So, please reboot to safeguard your computer and the University’s data. A good rule of thumb is to reboot at least once per week.

Farewell to Paulette Shekell of Enterprise Applications, effective Jan. 18.

Stan Waddell, executive director and information security officer, and Alex Everett, security system specialist, will discuss general information security best practices and the Systems Administration Initiative (SAI) at the February Webmasters meeting.

The event will take place on Thursday, Feb. 2 at 2 p.m. in Toy Lounge, Dey Hall. Please note that this is a change from the usual Webmasters meeting location.

The presentation is appropriate for a non-technical audience and will provide valuable information on information security best practices and the state of Web security today.

Webmasters meetings are held the first Thursday of every month and are open to all UNC-Chapel Hill staff, faculty and students that wish to engage in conversation about Web technologies. From Web design enthusiasts to Web evangelists, from newbies to gurus, all are welcomed attend the monthly meetings to listen, learn and share.