Tuesday, October 23, 2012 // Issue 33, Volume 78 /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
THE DAILY COUGAR
T H E
O F F I C I A L
S T U D E N T
N E W S P A P E R
O F T H E
U N I V E R S I T Y
O F
H O U S T O N
Wi-Fi outages dot UH
S I N C E
1 9 3 4
OPINION
Samantha Wong Staff writer
University Information Technology is working to fix the Internet connection after students, faculty and staff reported problems with accessing some websites in different buildings around campus yesterday. According to the UIT website, the Internet problems started at 8:25 a.m. Monday. The Society of Manufacturing Engineers worked on the issue and found operational problems with some of the UHhosted Akamai Technologies, Inc. content servers, the UIT website said. Akamai is a content delivery network whose customers include Metacafe, Viacom Media Networks, USA Today and Apple, Inc. According to the website, SME tried to fix the Akamai servers, but there were no problems with the University’s websites. The reason students could access UH websites with no issues was that the problem was with UH’s firewall, said David Johnson, executive director of UH technical service support. “Our primary firewall was struggling,” Johnson said. “It was acting like it was corrupted in some way.” Johnson said the firewall didn’t simply block all access to non-UH websites, but problems varied from case to case. “For example, if you were getting
Crude costumes not kosher LIFE+ARTS
Upcoming arts events at UH SPORTS Students work in the M.D. Anderson Memorial Library where the Internet connection was still operational. Outages have been at many residence halls across campus. | Joshua Mann/The Daily Cougar your Internet through Wi-Fi, you were having no problems at all,” Johnson said. “It was very difficult to diagnose because of this.” Because the primary firewall didn’t fail completely, the system never switched to the backup, Johnson said. “You would have never known there was a problem, it would have seamlessly switched to the backup,”
Johnson said. “This is one of those rare times that something breaks in just the right way.” UH is working with Cisco Systems, Inc. to fix the firewall, Johnson said. “The beauty of software problems is that when they do go down, you just reload it,” Johnson said. UH has temporarily switched to the backup firewall, and Johnson
said students shouldn’t experience any more problems related to the issue. “Unless something corrupts the backup firewall, it should be business as usual,” Johnson said. “I don’t anticipate any more problems; I expect things to be rock-solid.”
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thedailycougar.com SGA
SGA to mix minds with constituents Kathleen Murrill Contributing writer
MindMixer, a virtual town hall service, will soon be implemented in order to enhance the Student Government Association’s current in-person method and encourage a more active participation by UH students. Through MindMixer, students will be able to submit their ideas on a variety of topics or issues in the UH community, give feedback on others’ ideas or second ones they support, according to the website. Then, some ideas will be taken to
an open vote to identify which are most important to students. SGA Vice President Turner Harris cited his reasons for supporting this senate initiative. “We are looking into this technology to augment our senators’ current in-person town halls, which consistently fail to meet our expectations as far as collecting actionable or valuable input,” Harris said. Recently, Kansas State University used MindMixer to get student feedback on the University’s new campus master plan. Topics on the forum ranged from campus
character and what distinguishes the University, to students’ ideas on what areas needed improvement. Kansas State yielded hundreds of ideas and participants, according to the website. SGA intends to utilize MindMixer in the same way and gear the service toward a continued advancement of UH. The University will also have the opportunity to rename MindMixer once it is available on campus. Some ideas include ImproveUH and BeHeardUH, Harris said. The cost for MindMixer was included in SGA’s FY13 budget and
approved during the organization’s second meeting this semester with the stipulation that the vice president must give monthly reports on MindMixer, Harris said. Harris is optimistic that the service will help connect SGA and UH students, increasing the amount of student feedback. “We want to use this technology to facilitate deeper engagement with UH constituents and allow them to become contributors to the UH community,” Harris said. news@thedailycougar.com.
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TOMORROW Profile of shooting guard Joe Young.
COUNTDOWN
8
Days until Halloween.
Better book your dentist appointment now.