Most laptop computer users will notice their lap getting very warm while they use their machine. Very recently there have been incidents in Vancouver and Kamloops where laptop computers have shorted out or overheated causing burns and even a fatality.

From the CBC article –  a list of laptop safety precautions:

• Always operate on a hard surface that allows ventilation. Soft materials can block the airflow vents and cause it to overheat.
• If it is not possible to avoid using a soft surface, an optional heat-sink base should be used to maintain cooling.
• Always shut down your laptop, even for short periods of time, especially when placed in a carry bag.
• Inspect and clean the air vents on a weekly basis. Forced-air dusters can be used to keep the vents clean and free from debris.
• Replace any equipment or parts that do not work.
• Using a laptop desk or cooler to allow air circulation between the laptop and the desk
• Visit the Health Canada recall listings website to see if a laptop has been recalled.
• Review the manufacturers’ website for additional safety tips and recommended maintenance.

Blue Skying Again

Everyone in IT Services at TRU is working hard to see Project SAGE a success. This project (the biggest IT project in TRU’s history) involves the standardization of TRU’s Student, Finance, Advancement and HR systems on Banner Version 8 as well as many other new modules that will improve services for students, faculty and staff. Human Resources, Payroll and Finance went live in April 2009 and the big push is on for Admissions go live in October. Once Student Admissions goes live it will be all-hands-on-deck completing data conversion and other functionality  for the Open Learning and Campus Student Registration go-live in June, 2010.

But what happens after go-live in 2010? Here are some of our plans and predictions over the next few years. Ok 18 months…

Cloud Computing, the next big thing, is upon us.

Gartner defines cloud computing as a style of computing where massively scalable IT-related capabilities are provided “as a service” using Internet technologies to multiple external customers.

Cloud computing will have a major impact on how IT services are provided into the future. We are also looking at virtualization of our desktop environments to improve student access, flexibility and availability, all the while reducing our carbon footprint.

The continued evolution of our synchronous (Video Conferencing, Collaboration Tools like Wimba or Elluminate) and asynchronous (ie Blackboard, Moodle) learning technologies is a given. We can anticipate more time and place-shifting tools like audio and video podcasts being used by TRU faculty. Multimedia equipment will be available for most classrooms on campus.

A funny thing happened on the way to the future: some things got bigger and some things got much smaller. Desktop computing will move slowly to virtual solutions (ie no more black box under your desk) and TRU Students will use smarter (and smaller) wireless mobile devices on the campus. This will require mobile computing versions of the TRU website and other services such as registration and scheduling. These mobile devices will also be location-aware.

Monitors, however, will get bigger and bigger as new display technologies make larger displays more affordable.

The New Banner system will allow new ways of providing services to students, faculty and staff, improve internal business processes and open up new partnership opportunities with service providers. Once the dust settles from the go-live of our new Banner system, work will need to start on phase II of a number of modules to improve student services and processes further. This system will allow better reporting and decision making to happen. We will also undertake a review of our current Novell File, Print and Groupware software.

Pandemics and other potential threats to TRU will need technologies to ensure campus safety and allow teaching and learning to continue remotely. As mentioned, all the pieces will come together to let students study where they want and faculty teach where they want.

While this happens, we will continue to work on our Information Security, Service Management (ITIL) and Project Management capabilities within IT Services. All new technology decisions will be made with consideration to their environmental impact. No planning is done in isolation. IT Services will continue its partnership and liaison with the Senate sub-committee on Instructional Development and Support as well as the EATAC committee.

Our Technology Services team at TRU has worked really hard to virtualize our data centre and our Client Services group has been planning virtual desktop environments for some time now. The business benefits of virtualization include reduced energy consumption, lowered costs, increased reliability and a reduction in the complexity of our IT environment. This supports our university mission and allows our faculty and researchers to continuously innovate. This innovation usually has nothing to do with our internal IT infrastructure.

I’ve been going on and on about how Cloud Computing will one day, very soon, move all our infrastructure skyward into the clouds, to be run “somewhere else.” Indeed, to many stakeholders, Cloud Computing has been sold as the final nail in the coffin of central IT. Whether that is true or not time will tell, all I know is, as a CIO, I have to move our organization into this new world.

Trouble was, I wasn’t clear on how to get there. This is starting to become clearer as I’m starting to realize what I want out of Cloud Computing.

1. I want server instances deployed for our customers quickly. 10 Minutes? 1 minute?
2. I want to be able to scale up and down on demand. Like all schools we have peak registration periods and some slower times in the summer. I want to be able to be able to dynamically scale processors, memory, and disk elastically as needed.
3. I want easy backup and restore. As time goes by, the servers and tapes become less important, the data more so. I want it protected without the cost and complexity of backup data centres in our organization.
4. I want all these ‘aaS’es to talk to each other. I need a common API and security framework to allow all the applications appearing as services to talk to each other.
5. I want control. I want to be able to manage hybrids of disposable and private clouds, I want to be able to move virtual cloud instances between service providers as necessary to reduce every IT administrator’s fear: vendor lock-in. Oh, and I want all the IP mapping to be easy.

I want the cloud environments of tomorrow to be as secure and reliable as the internal services we currently provide. Ultimately, the move to this cloud economy has nothing to do with CIO’s and internal IT departments as organizations start taking advantage of digital combinatorial innovation. But it’s up to us IT leaders s to Begin the Beguine.

And another excellent presentation from Simon Wardley on the topic.

Cloud Computing is a generic term used to describe the disruptive transformation in IT towards a service-based economy driven by a set of economic, cultural, and technological  conditions.

His definition moves our thinking away from the narrow, vendor-driven definition of cloud computing (relating to products and technologies) to include the social, economic factors leading to this shift to services. Spot on I say. From OSCON 2009:

New York soon will hum, the Electric Car has come

- “Stupid” by the Long Winters

Maybe it was too soon to write off GM as they recently announced that the new plugin hybrid Chevy Volt will get an EPA rating of a staggering 230 mpg. The Toyota Prius only gets 51 MPG in the city so this announcement is pretty incredible. As it is a plugin hybrid and if you have a short commute, you could potentially never be using the gas ”generator” if you plugged your Volt in each night. 

Imagine what a game changer that would be to the automobile and oil industries?

I’m also imagining how eerily quiet the streets will become in this world of electric cars. I’ll have to be more careful jaywalking…

It’s taken me a while to get the right catch-phrase for what I’ve called “user” or “consumer” computing. I may start using “Technology Populism” as coined by Forrester Research:

Thanks to an advancing technology-native workforce, ubiquitous broadband, and abundant collaboration and Social Computing tools, information workers can now provision their own software tools, information sources, and social networks via the Web to support their jobs. Individual people, not IT organizations, are fueling the next wave of IT adoption we’re calling Technology Populism.

You don’t have to go very far to realize the users have taken over. Our web analytics tool on the tru.ca site shows growth in personal devices beyond desktops and laptops connecting to our services. Check out the top Operating Systems of devices connecting:

1. Windows
2. Mac
3. Linux
4. iPhone
5. iPod
6. Playstation 3
7. Symbian OS
8. Nintendo Wii

Gasp, what’s a poor IT department to do, especially with all the potential data loss, security breaches, islands of information, intellectual property challenges that these “rogue” users could possibly create for the organization?

I reckon the trick will be to get the mix right between good policy and practices to support our client’s information needs. Help with integrations and flexible enterprise architecture and reporting. Maybe try out some new stuff…

We could also do a lot of work to make those Web 0.0 enterprise applications work as easily as most web apps today. IT folk need to take a deep breath and think back to all those new technologies like mini computers and PC’s to realize a rationalization process will occur. This diagram nicely illustrates these waves: