Readiness Disclosure Pursuant to the Year 2000 Readiness and Disclosure Act of 1998

Y2K Staffing

The University of Delaware Information Technologies staff are prepared for the Year 2000 transition and anticipate no problems. As a precaution, many IT staff will be on site 12/31/1999 through 1/1/2000. Others will be on call and able to report quickly should an emergency situation occur. Some services will be unavailable between 12/31 and 1/1.

Staffing

Key personnel from all units of IT: Network System Services (NSS), User Services (US), University Media Services (UMS) and System Security, Access and Help Center Services (SSAHS) will be on site to watch the New Year arrive. IT Operations will continue to serve as the communications hub for all systems trouble. IT Operations will be staffed 24/7 and will use existing problem escalation call lists and other sources to determine who to call in the event of system problems. All Operations staff will be available over the holiday. All individuals in Production Control and Operations will be available 12/31/99 and 01/01/00 if necessary. All on-call IT personnel will be within an hour's drive during the holiday.

Systems Security, Access and Help Center will be fully staffed over the working days between 12/21/1999 and 1/1/2000. The 831-6000 help line will be checked three times per day during the University holiday break. Urgent calls will be returned with 24 hours. In the event of a system failure, a message will be recorded on the 831-6000 line. The SSAHS director will be on-site during the Y2K transition and all Access and Help Center staff will be on call and within an hour's drive should a problem occur.

Over the holiday period when the University is closed, the Manager of Desktop and Client services will be the first point of contact for problems from the Help Center. User Services has a pool of staff who can be called, if necessary, to resolve problems. No extended vacations by US staff have been planned, and emergency absences will be covered.

University Media Services has assigned primary contacts for Campus Cable, ITV sites/network and Classrooms. These contacts will be in 302 Pearson and other sites 12/31/1999 through 1/1/2000. UMS has also prepared contingency plans. For example, each ITV room can videotape and ship tapes; and classrooms and ITV Crestrons can use remote controls.) The campus cable distribution system is an analog system and not subject to Y2K problems. All UD originated digital channels (Channel 2 & Channel 50) are Y2K compatible.

MIS will be on normal production support for the weekend of 12/31/1999-1/2/2000. All staff will be available and reachable and MIS will be fully staffed the first week in January.

System Availability

To ensure a smooth transition into the New Year, the SIS system will not be available starting New Year's Eve evening, 12/31/1999 until 6:00 a.m. New Year's day, 1/1/2000. This means that on-line, Web and IVR access to SIS will not be available during that time. The scheduled production processes for Friday, 12/31/1999, will run.

Messages will be posted on the Help Center web page next to notify users of planned downtime and a message will be put on the IVR system at the time it is made unavailable.

Between 4 p.m., Friday, 12/24, and 6 p.m., Saturday, 12/25, no tape mounts or other operator intervention will be available on central systems. Preventive maintenance on the building electrical system has been scheduled between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. on both Tuesday and Wednesday, 12/28-12/29. During this period, systems may be briefly interrupted on short notice if electrical system repairs are required. For more information, contact Betsy Mackenzie (betsy@udel.edu, 831-1975).

Questions or comments
Copyright © 1999, University of Delaware.
Last Updated: December 23, 1999