During the Tuesday, 6 May maintenance window, maintenance work affecting a number of services will occur, starting at 5:30 PM and being completed before midnight. The following work is planned:
Distribution routers: software will be updated on the routers serving all buildings in the areas listed below. All network services (including Wi-Fi and IP telephones) may be disrupted in those areas for up to 30 minutes. This work was previously announced for the maintenance window on 29 April but could not be completed then.
Main campus: all buildings in the area within Prince Alfred St, Somerset St and Lucas Avenue, up to and including Biological Sciences Building, the Library and Psychology
Hill campus: all buildings which are on the south side of Prince Alfred St and west of New House (inclusive).
Distribution routers: software will be updated on the routers serving the university data centres. All services hosted in data centres are likely to be affected for at least brief outages, possibly for as long as an hour in the event of an unexpected problem. As above, this work was previously announced for the maintenance window on 29 April but could not be completed then.
Server software updates: software on the servers which provide the following services will be updated, resulting in outages of up to 15 minutes per server:
DNS
DHCP
NTP
RT
Web proxies
Registration system
Incoming e-mail
Outgoing e-mail
IMAP e-mail mailboxes
Mailing lists
SMS
Provisioning (web proxy autodiscovery)
Wi-Fi and VPN authentication
Network graphs
Network monitoring
Terminal Four content management system
RU Single Sign-On system
Main web server (www.ru.ac.za, etc)
University administration and meal booking systems
SEALS Library consortium services
Network printing services (iPrint/PaperCut)
File servers/home directories (gnu, serval, studentfiles)
PC login service for public labs
Archibus
Access switch: software will be updated on the network switch in the Drostdy Barracks building. All network services (including Wi-Fi and IP telephones) will be disrupted for 30 minutes. As above, this work was previously announced for the maintenance window on 29 April but could not be completed then.
While we try to publish a list of all service-affecting work here in advance, the list should not be considered exhaustive and other low impact work may also be undertaken during the maintenance window.
This maintenance work is being undertaken in the ITSC-approved scheduled maintenance window.