noticeboard.ru.ac.za

During the Tuesday, April 7th maintenance window, maintenance work affecting a number of services will occur, starting at 5:30 PM and being completed before midnight. The following will occur:

• Web proxy servers: software on the web proxy servers will be updated, and a configuration change will be implemented. Access to the web may be affected at times throughout the maintenance window.
• University administration server: the main administration server, protea.ru.ac.za, will be upgraded. All University administrative applications, including the meal booking system and other web applications on ross.ru.ac.za or dmuapps.ru.ac.za, will be unavailable for at least two hours.
• Data centres distribution routers: the software on the distribution routers serving the data centres will be updated. This is likely to cause all Wi-Fi access across campus to be unavailable for between five and 15 minutes, but access to all other services should be unaffected.
• Access switches: software updates will be done on a number of access switches, causing a network outage of up to ten minutes in the following buildings:
  
  • AMM
  • Anthropology GIS Lab
  • Biological Sciences (1 Gbps ports only)
  • Botany
  • Drostdy Barracks
  • GRPGV
  • Library
  • New Holland
  • New House annexe 4
  • Physics
  • RATT servers
  • Struben
  • The Greens
• 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
  • E-mail mailboxes
  • Webmail
  • Mailing lists
  • SMS
  • Apple Software Update Server
  • Provisioning (web proxy autodiscovery, telephone provisioning)
  • Wi-Fi and VPN authentication
  • CHERTL Evaluation Assistant
  • Network graphs
  • Guest network access
  • Network monitoring
  • RU Single Sign-on
  • Terminal Four content management system
• Firewalls: software on the firewalls which connect the Internet to the campus, SEALS and public networks will be updated. As the firewalls operate as a redundant pair, no noticeable outages are expected during this maintenance.

This maintenance work is being undertaken in the ITSC-approved scheduled maintenance window. More information about maintenance windows and maintenance periods.

There is currently a known problem with direct printing (e.g. to the print unit) from protea. Printing on protea is complicated, and this might take a while to resolve.

Pass-through printing (where protea prints to a printer attached to you computer) should still work, so you can use that as a work around.