Quarterly summary

July 2009 through September 2009

These summaries were taken mainly from a team brainstorm on 22-September-2009. If you are interested in the raw list, you can find it in the meeting notes at 22-September-2009 Meeting Notes. This page aggregates highlights only and does not contain the full list of things that got done. (In case someone's counting LOCs, metaphorically speaking...)

High level

  • Debathena (formerly Athena 10) delivered
    • Debathena, a revolutionary and reactive re-write of the Athena academic computing environment for a new platform, Ubuntu Linux, went live in MIT's public student computing environment this summer. Debathena shifts the focus from a one-size-fits all model for Athena that takes over any machine it is installed on, to a layered environment on top of a popular, standard Linux distribution. Debathena allows clients to choose what features of Athena they want to install, from a minimal set enabling basic integration with MIT's infrastructure and access to third-party software, to the full cluster deployment for creating a full, easy to deploy public workstation from bare metal.
    • Debathena works in a VM, via a LiveCD, or installed as a primary environment on an Ubuntu or dual-boot intel machine
    • Debathena was delivered as a highly collaborative effort between CSS (FSX, SD, AUX), ISDA, OIS, and SIPB
    • Impact: Debathena is in all public and several private (departmental & residential) student computing locations and used by all of our undergraduate students and most of our graduate students. It is used for academic coursework and for productivity student computing
  • Orientation 2009
    • The class of 2013, along with new faculty members, have been successfully oriented. Highlights of Orientation this year include record attendance at Computing at MIT classes (in spite of cuts in food), and an expanded presence for hands-on support and new faculty orientation. We also cut back significantly on paper and consolidated all of our printed documentation into a new Computing at MIT Map, which was well received.
    • A collaboration between FSX, SD, AUX with participation from the Libraries, OEIT and OCW. We also had much higher student staff participation than in previous years, which worked out terrifically
    • Impact: Class of 2013, incoming graduate students, new faculty
  • Student Laptop Loaner Program in partnership with the Service Desk
    • The Student Laptop Loaner Program has been incorporated into the Service Desk and FSX. The program was simplified, streamlined, and moved to N42, with new guidelines and a new model developed in time for start of classes. So far student and faculty reaction has been very positive.
    • Impact: students who are unable to use their personal laptop or do not have a personal laptop; faculty teaching with a laptop requirement
  • Energy and Printing evaluation projects completed
    • A lot of evaluation, testing, and feasibility analysis was done on energy and printing related projects. This includes a large-scale assessment of printing across several administrative departments and the public student computing environment by Xerox and MIT staff (IS&T, VPF, Facilities), new metrics tools and analysis for student printing on campus, evaluation of desktop energy saving tools, etc.
    • Impact: Background for feasible and cost-effective implementations of strategic printing improvements and energy saving measures; to anticipate and be one step ahead of inevitable task force recommendations and projects

Full list of highlights

  • Implementation of CSS 2.0 org changes and partnerships with…err…partners: SD, OEIT, CCS, ACCORD, GIS, CET, ETC
    Debathena (Athena 10) delivered
  • Public cluster upgrades, space maintenance, Sun Solaris retirement
    • Ubuntu-based release of Athena
    • Development of metrics and data collection tools for public student computing spaces
  • Orientation 2009 / Fall Readiness
    • New student & faculty Orientation
    • Computing at MIT: The Map / Computing at MIT: The Sleeve
  • ACCORD
    • A video strategy for MIT
    • Debathena on a VM (presentation, proof of concept)
  • Software
    • Streamline student MATLAB release (temp. release engineering tasks)
    • "What Runs Where" updated / Keyserver pilot developed
  • Student Laptop Loaner Program in partnership with SD
  • Energy and printing projects
    • VPF/Xerox printing study
    • 1E/Energy Saver evaluation