
<h1>Staff  (mitch) Activities and Schools for Week begnning 2007/03/17</h1>
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<h2>School Hours Summary</h2>
[UofC spring break week]

[CPS some carried-over ISAT testing this week]
<ul>
	<li>ENTR/Leader joint Library -- Tues 3/20, for 4:20; Weds. for 1:30, total 5:50</li>
	<li>Till weds 2:00, Fri 2:00. total 4:00</li>
	<li>Woodlawn - Mon. 3/19, phone and email for 30 min; Weds. 3/21 in-person for 45 min, total 1:15</li>
	<li>Woodson - thurs 1:15</li>
</ul>
Sheesh, Angus, can't you sit <em>anywhere </em>else?  I need the keyboard back!
<strong>===============================</strong><strong> </strong>

<hr />
<h2>Status on previously deferred items, ongoing projects, and specific to-do’s</h2>
<ul>
	<li>Schedule a Tech Coordinators meeting!
<ul>
	<li>Inquiry mail went out Tuesday morning</li>
	<li>Sparse responses.  But looks like we should go with the inservice-day option again.</li>
</ul>
</li>
	<li>Woodson,Meet with Larry Spearman and Dr. Arnall re the latter's classroom management ideas
<ul>
	<li>Sara and I scheduled for 2:30 Thursday, Arnall had to cancel but did talk with us for 10 minutes.  See report in Woodson area.</li>
	<li>Return next monday afternoon.</li>
	<li>Our priority is to support Spearman.</li>
</ul>
</li>
	<li>Lyceum new version test installs (for Murray)
<ul>
	<li>Not done</li>
</ul>
</li>
	<li>Till — RC installation automation (look at Fiske GPO logon script for a regedit example, also Sanjaya's desktop script at Murray) (Also try GPO software install key, as at Ray)
<ul>
	<li>See  Till report.  This task item will be closed out,  as "Didn't work".</li>
</ul>
</li>
	<li>Servers space and backup (esp WIT and CWD)
<ul>
	<li>Look into different backup options
<ul>
	<li>V. Galtsev not much help</li>
	<li>Got a new NAS.  Close to what we need!  See next week's report, Saturday.</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
</li>
	<li>Start on Apache 2 / PHP 5 installation on WIT server
<ul>
	<li>To support WPMU among other things</li>
	<li>Probably should be done (solo task essentially) <strong>AHEAD of CPS spring break week</strong>, so that we can do some group development in WPMU and transfer of standalone blogs to WPMU, when staff and NSPs will be available to execute those.</li>
</ul>
</li>
	<li>WP standalones upgrade to 2.1.2
<ul>
	<li>WIT (blogs.cuip.net) server done last week</li>
	<li>blogs2 to be done -- discussed wth Erin but as a secondary part of what she will be doing</li>
	<li>It wouldn't be too hard to adapt the "newblog" installation perl script into one for this upgrade
<ul>
	<li>Jimmy Salvatore is on the case!</li>
</ul>
</li>
	<li>After this round, we can put in the "Instant upgrade" plugin and leave it up to each blog owner</li>
</ul>
</li>
	<li>WP standalones theme and plugin distribution
<ul>
	<li>Erin will continue selecting / editing themes</li>
	<li>The newblog script also would be good starting point for one to handle the implementation/installation of this, though with considerable manual intervention possibly needed</li>
	<li>This may not be ready for CPS Break Week ...bt it would sure be nice if it were!</li>
</ul>
</li>
	<li>Carried forward: Techwiki entries for
<ul>
	<li>INSTR updates from legacy SI, part I, how to get from SI to file: this entry exsts, add note about not trusting floppies, use thumbdrive or direct upload to server</li>
</ul>
<ul>
	<li>INSTR updates from legacy SI, part II, what to do with the file — stub only in place, take from email sent to Bryan</li>
</ul>
<ul>
	<li>Power-on passwords and Setup Admin Passwords: take from email with Jimmy and Linda Sudduth</li>
</ul>
<ul>
	<li>Added to this to-do list: the CPSWIRELESS notes</li>
</ul>
<ul>
	<li><strong>Status this week: </strong>Umm .... no progress.<strong>
</strong></li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
<strong>———————————————</strong>
<h3>Longer-term plans, noted pro-forma, progress not particularly expected in any given week</h3>
<ul>
	<li>Carried forward:: Installation and tryout of Retrospect for desktop backups in CUIP lab, using WD NetCenter Drive
<ul>
	<li>Brought in my own copy of the CD (the office copy is misplaced)</li>
</ul>
<ul>
	<li>Did not install. Try again next week.</li>
	<li><strong>NEW this week 07/03/22:</strong> I like the newer NAS better!</li>
</ul>
</li>
	<li>Deferred longer term: Trial installation of Skeletonz CMS or other CMS. Last week: –Still deferred.</li>
	<li>Look into other Wikis, which may support more CMS-like features, plus individual page ownerships</li>
	<li>Waiting for spring break or summer: look into “Google Apps for Domains” [as it is no longer called]</li>
</ul>
<strong>———————————————</strong>
<h3>To-do items added this week for next, or new continuing projects</h3>
<ul>
	<li>Space and backups for our Linux servers
<ul>
	<li>Make sense out of which ones will accept NFS cross-mounts from each other and from new NAS</li>
	<li>Decide whether it is better to use FTP, SMBMOUNT, or NFS to augment server storage (and backup storage) with new NAS.</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
<strong>===============================</strong>
<h2>This week’s activity not at or for a specific school</h2>
<strong>————————————————</strong>
<h3>CUIP Team Building</h3>
<ul>
	<li>Some shifting around for Christie's schools.  I accompanied Sara to Woodson, where she will smoothly take over projects; but current focus there on Dr. Arnall's requests and working wth Mr. Spearman fall more into the tech bailiwick.</li>
</ul>
<strong>————————————————</strong>
<h3>Educational Computing Community</h3>
<ul>
	<li>Email with Compteach list to set date and agenda for next CUIP TechCo meeting</li>
</ul>
<strong>————————————————</strong>
<h3>eCUIP</h3>
<strong>————————————————</strong>
<h3>Chicago Web Docent</h3>
<ul>
	<li>     The CWD server is a main focus for the "server space" and "server backups" items laced thru this report.</li>
</ul>
<strong>————————————————</strong>
<h3>CUIP Office — Facility and Computing</h3>
<ul>
	<li>Brought in a labeller to continue neatening up the office.</li>
	<li>Ordered and received a new supply of 10 copies of the Owl Book (O'Reilly publishing "Learning the Unix Operatng System"), Fifth Edition.</li>
</ul>
<strong>————————————————</strong>
<h3>CUIP Servers</h3>
<ul>
	<li>  (Weekend, @ beginning of week)  Shopped for and brought in new NAS, which is supposed to work with Samba, FTP, <em>and</em> NFS.</li>
	<li> (Weekend, @ end of week)  Worked with this some more, had backups for CWD almost entirely working.  But ran into file size limit, because underlying disk format is ... wait for it ... FAT!  So it won't take tar files bigger than 2 GB.  And non-tar archival file-copying loses all owner and mode info.  So I set it to reformat its disk to ext2 or ext3, which they anticipate will be needed and build into the control interface.  It reached 100% and rebooted, but did not reappear on the network.  I guess I should go visit it.</li>
</ul>
<strong>===============================</strong>
<h2>This week’s activity at or for specific schools</h2>
<h3>Canter</h3>
<ul>
	<li>Online Thurs 10 mins.  Based on Russ's report from convo with Ms. Ahad about students with INSTR logins getting "password expired" messages, I remote-desktopped to the Canter server and reset these attributes.  We don't know why these sometimes go over to the wrong setting.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Entrepreneurship at South Shore</h3>
<ul>
	<li>ENTR/Leader joint Library -- Tues 3/20, for 4:20.</li>
	<li>Updated server (Server 2003) to SP2</li>
	<li>Installed student lookup-only version of the client on a couple stations in the student cluster, and after some wireless woes installed full version on librarian's circulation desk computer.</li>
	<li>With Ms. Conlon, got SI Athena listings for the two schools from two different offices, input them into Athena using "Patron Porter".  There are 800+ users.</li>
	<li>For some reason, the books we imported last week were not available to the student lookup-only version of Athena.  They weren't lost.     The software finally let us transfer from the invisible Collection to the main Collection, where they can be used.</li>
	<li>Helped Ms. Conlon practice using the software for check-out/check-in, even without scanner.</li>
	<li>The barcode scanner uses PS/2 keyboard port, but the circulation desk computer is all-USB. Maybe it will help to switch over to the Dell 270 sitting idle on the desk. Consult with Erik and/or Russ on Wednesday.</li>
	<li>Did Norwegian disk on that Dell 270 [techco and zprotect both were locked out], then installed SMC USB Wireless, renamed, remediated, updates, and installed Athena.  So this one will be a good alternative.  (At the moment, these 2 computers are sharing one screen, one mouse, one kbd.)</li>
	<li>Weds. 3/21, with Russ, for 1:30</li>
	<li>We got the scanner working on the Dell tower model with the PS/2 ports.  The scanner does require a keyboard of that type; that is, it doesn't work to have just the scanner going into the computer at thePS/2 port and a keyboard separately working via USB.</li>
	<li>Added books from diskettes she has gotten outside the main Spalding HS transfer CD.</li>
	<li>For some reason, the USB wireless adapter stopped being detected;  worked after reloading driver + utilities.  That experience, and the general slowness of the wireless at that location for an admin function like this, make us want to string a cable.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Leadership at South Shore</h3>
<ul>
	<li>See Entrepreneurship. The library is a joint operation.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Till</h3>
<ul>
	<li>Weds 3/21.  Checked-in with  Linda, discussed next year plans, our TechCo meeting scheduling, IMPACT readiness.</li>
	<li>Reading Counts is not much used in the lab after all.  But for the sake of the Library (and potentially more classrooms) we still want to make it work for different logins.  In any case,  Jimmy and I determined that the correct data path is just in a client-computer registry key, and we have an almost complete solution, pending a bit of clarification on VBS syntax for setting reg keys.</li>
	<li>Friday.  That approach works but doesn't work :) .  I decided to give up and put it all back as it was.</li>
	<li>Worked from Primary Library.  Inez described plans and student activities connected with the Wright 3.  The students are saving their "Letter to the Author"  documents to the desktop, with potential dangerous interaction with Deep Freeze.  I showed her the Thaw Space drive and suggested having students save there (or to network folder).  This needs some followup.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Woodlawn</h3>
<ul>
	<li>Mon. 3/19, phone and email for 30 min - Advice on E-Rate and wireless</li>
	<li>Weds. 3/21 in person conversation with Carisa on same topic, 45 mins.  She called back Bill the E-Rate Wireless guy while I was there and asked for cards for both laptops and desktops but in limited numbers.  This will imply wireless access points throughout the building rather than just portables to go with the cart.  He mentioned getting gigabit switches in. She asked directly "The plan will not involve disconnecting any currently wired rooms, right?" and he confirmed.</li>
	<li>Still on our to-do list:  Clean re-install of  OS etc., for Ms. Hamilton's two infected computers.</li>
	<li>They are starting on their annual African country-per-classroom projects.  I reminded Shaz to please sub-lend my Missa Luba tour-of-Africa video disk to Carisa.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Woodson</h3>
<ul>
	<li>Thurs 3/22 with Sara, for 1:15.  We met only briefly with Dr. Arnall   but then for a full discussion with Larry Spearman on Dr. Arnall's issues.</li>
	<li>[CONFIDENTIAL] Dr. Arnall's tech-based classroom-management ideas strike me as okay in themselves, but not really worth the fuss.  This is not likely to result in something portable that can significantly  contribute to the learning environment at other schools, or even other classes at CGWS.</li>
	<li>But it probably is worth the effort for CUIP to stay in good graces of all parties, and relieve Mr. Spearman of dealing with the issues on his own.  Also it is good for us and the school to have us working closely with Spearman and exchanging tech insights.  And whether or not the big project comes to fruition, the work can easily help the tech environment in small ways right away,for instance by showing him how to control the printer queue.</li>
	<li>We have a return meeting Monday afterschool, then probably will arrange to work in the school during CPS break :(.</li>
	<li>Sara  did a quick check-in with  the librarian, Ms  Escadero.</li>
</ul>