UMF Lab Guidelines

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Preamble

As of Fall semester 1998, we expect nearly a dozen more-or-less independent sets of computers, or "computer labs," run by the Library, Media Center, and various departments, scattered across the UMF campus, in addition to the 4+ labs we run in the Computer Center. This is nearly double the 1997 total. If we in the Computer Center are to effectively support this many labs, with their diverse interests and needs, in something approaching a 40-hour work week, we need to set some clear expectations, goals, and even restrictions. We also need to share with the departments a little bit of the cost of supporting a lab; otherwise, the demand for a free good (namely, Computer Center support) could grow almost infinitely. And finally, in creating these guidelines, we are trying to give departments as much control over their labs as possible. This is our first try at defining some goals and expectations. We hope it is not so much a set of rules to follow, as it is a set of understandings between the Computer Center and the lab owners. See also: List of labs

Terms

Lab manager

The faculty or staff member who is responsible for the layout and configuration of the lab, and with whom the Computer Center staff will interact on issues regarding the lab.

Designated backup

The faculty or staff member who, in the absence of the lab manager, assumes responsibility for the lab. Like the lab manager, the designated backup must be fully involved in and knowledgeable about all lab operations.

Lab liaison

The Computer Center staff member responsible for helping set up the lab and maintaining its configuration. This is not necessarily the same person who will fix day-to-day problems.

Support Levels and Standards Document

All hardware and software is supported at levels defined in the Computing Standards Document, ranging from "Prohibited" and "Not Supported" to "Full Support." The contents of that document are subject to negotiation, but not to compromise. Items listed as "Not Supported" will receive no installation and no troubleshooting from the Computer Center. Purchase such items at your need and at your peril. See the Standards Document itself for more information.

Help desk

The place at the Computer Center where lab problems are reported.

 

Guideline Summary

If the Computer Center is not funding the lab hardware (that is, if the lab "belongs" to another department), we require the department designate a lab manager, one person, with whom we can coordinate setup and changes. The designated lab manager is responsible for basic configuration and maintenance of the lab, within the constraints agreed upon with the Computer Center, including:

• planning the initial setup and long-term prosperity of the lab, in consultation with the Computer Center;
• controlling the physical layout of the lab, including moving furniture, unpacking boxes, ensuring physical security, making sure sufficient power is available, dealing with Facilities Management as needed, and so on;
• ensuring the lab software is adequately backed up, and restoring backup images to machines with errant configurations;
• accepting problem reports and relaying them to the Computer Center as needed;
• maintaining a license and warranty repository, and handling all warranty requests;
• and other similar tasks.

The Computer Center, for its part, will provide the network infrastructure, computer troubleshooting, and support, including:

• helping design and implement network connectivity and printing mechanisms;
• providing support for standard hardware and software configurations, and support of special-purpose configurations as our time permits;
• providing the necessary training and help to establish a backup and restore process;
• and other tasks that allow us to support as many different department labs as possible.

Details of the responsibilities and constraints of both the Computer Center and the lab manager are explained in more detail in the next sections.

Guideline Details

Initial setup

1. The Computer Center will set up a new lab only over summer or winter break, and we must have a 60 days notice to talk things over, clarify needs, design network layout and suggest required network hardware, etc. with the department's designated lab manager.
2. All hardware in the lab will be supported at levels as designated in the UMF Computer Center Hardware Standards. Purchase of unsupported hardware will result in a lack of support from the Computer Center, up to and including a refusal to attempt to troubleshoot the computer, and refusal to connect the computer to the campus network.
3. All software in the lab will be supported at levels as designated in the UMF Computer Center Software Standards. If unsupported software is purchased, then we will not help troubleshoot even basic problems like printing, importing or exporting files from or to the application, display problems, user questions, etc.
4. The Computer Center liaison would like to work closely with the lab manager to help set up the initial software configuration of the lab, both to ensure the most effective use of software and to ensure that the setup conforms to related policies, like UNET's internet access control policy. This working relationship needs to continue as changes are made to the software configuration over the semesters.

Physical layout

1. The lab manager is responsible for the general layout of the lab, since he or she usually knows more about how it will be used than anyone else. This includes planning for growth, ensuring there is adequate access to power outlets, dealing with Facilities Management as necessary, and so on.
2. We at the Computer Center are not available for hauling, unpacking, cleaning, moving furniture, and so on. We encourage you to find less specialized people for this sort of task. Work-study comes to mind.
3. We are usually able to help with the physical installation of network cables, provided we have sufficient notice and the task is managable. If it involves large numbers of machines, or drilling through concrete walls, or other unexpected complications, we may request or require that you engage Facilities Management or an outside contractor.
4. The lab manager is responsible for all aspects of security, including setting hours, on-site staffing, arranging who locks and unlocks doors, who has after-hours access, and so on.
5. We do prefer labs be as publicly available as possible, and accessible as many hours as possible, and we recommend using security hardware as applicable. The more public the lab is, the more support it will get. The lab manager is responsible for installing any security hardware, or coordinating the installation with Facilities Management. However, because Computer Center staff may work on any of the 3 shifts, there must be only one key or one combination per lab, and that key or combination must be available to Computer Center staff at all hours.

Backing up and restoring the lab software

1. We expect the lab manager to take responsibility for establishing the software contents of the lab, maintaining backups, and restoring those backups as needed. These guidelines are written with the assumption that the lab manager will be willing and eager to take such control. Other arrangements may, just possibly, be made, but they must be negotiated explicitly.
2. For IBM-compatible PCs, we'll provide 2 GB per lab for disk images. (Please note this may not be immediately possible in the fall semester.) That's enough for several configurations, although we encourage one configuration whenever possible, both for ease of maintenance, and ease of use on the students' part. Even 2 GB may not be enough space for special machine configurations, so the lab manager must know how to re-install and recreate special machines should the need arise.
3. When the Computer Center upgrades the Novell network, additional space for saving different lab configurations may be available on a for-fee basis.
4. For Macintoshes, we have a Jaz drive available for checkout, or the lab manager can purchase a drive of their own. The lab manager must purchase Jaz disks, for as many backup images as the lab needs to save. However, we still encourage one image only whenever possible, for ease of maintenance and ease of student use.
5. In no circumstances should the contents of a disk on a lab machine be thought of as irreplacable. We certainly will not think of it that way should the need arise to format or replace any disk. Use removable media or network drives for saving student work, and have backups of any data sets you store on disk.
6. In general, the lab manager has both authority and responsibility for disk images. If the manager makes untested changes that break a disk image, and has not taken the precaution of saving a working image, the Computer Center has no way to jump in and bail the lab out. Fixing broken lab setups will be queued with the same time frame as making changes to Computer Center labs (that is, we'll get to it between semesters).
7. Please note that for labs the Computer Center staff maintain themselves, like CC101, CC102, and so on, we only change the setup between semesters, and we require 6 weeks notice for a requested change. You might consider the reasons we've adopted such a conservative policy before making mid-semester changes in your own lab.
8. We encourage the lab manager to consult with the lab liason in planning changes to the lab configuration between semesters, to keep the lab liason "in the loop" and informed on the status of the lab, the location and viability of backup images, and so on. The more close the lab manager and the computer center liason work together, the better able the liason will be to understand and respond to the needs of a particular lab.
9. For its part, the Computer Center will provide both training and consulting in creating and restoring backup images. We want the lab manager to be happy and comfortable with this process.

Problem reporting and support

1. All problem reports for a lab must come through the lab manager, who will make some basic attempts to fix the problem, like restoring an appropriate backup image to the broken computer. If it can't be fixed, the lab manager will report the problem to the help desk, where it will be queued appropriately.
2. We encourage the lab manager to designate and work with another department member, so that a backup manager is available during vacations, sickness, loss of job, death, or other absences on the manager's part.
3. The Computer Center will not make any modifications to a lab without first consulting the lab manager, designated backup, or (in extremis) the department chair.
4. The Computer Center will queue lab problems in with the whole campus job queue, which we work on as steadily and quickly as possible. For hardware problems, fixes are contingent on the availability of replacement hardware; for software problems, fixes are dependent on the nature of the problem.
5. Please note that support for hardware and software is provided only up to the appropriate level as designated in our Standard Document. Hardware or software marked "Not Supported" will not be supported; purchase such products at your peril.
6. We will not handle hardware problems in a lab if the hardware is modifiable or experimented with by students. (This probably only applies to a portion of the computer science lab.)
7. We will not handle software problems in a lab if the contents of the hard disk are modifiable by students. The lab manager must restore a standard software image in such cases.
8. In general, we recommend against allowing disk modifications by students, and will instead help define an initial disk configuration that meets the variety of student needs, and will help set up the machine so that this configuration is stable and easily restorable.

Licenses, warranties, and other paperwork

1. Even in cases where the lab manager installs and maintains software, the Computer Center archives that software, and may be involved in restoring it. Therefore, we require that the lab manager establish a software license repository, a generally-agreed-upon place where the lab manager will store software licenses, and where the Computer Center staff can access them. This repository should store, at a minimum, both license and warranty information. The U. Maine software audit team will also require access to this information from time to time.
2. The lab manager should also take charge of all the paper, maintenance agreements, diskettes, CDs, documentation, and so on that comes with lab software and hardware.
3. The lab manager is responsible for pursuing all warranty-based repair and maintenance. The Computer Center can assist in documenting a claim, if needed.

Networking and printing

1. The Computer Center will provide and help install the software to connect all standard PCs and Macs to the Novell network, if requested. As mentioned earlier, we will also do basic network cabling, although we may demur for labs with complex cable requirements.
2. The Computer Center does not support Microsoft Windows sharing, nor Apple's AppleTalk, as a networking or printing option. See our Standards document for more information.
3. For basic printing in multi-machine labs, we recommend networked printers from the supported-hardware list, connected to Novell print queues, and will help set those up. Other printing arrangements, like plotters or large-job printers, are supported at levels as designated in our Standards document.
4. The lab manager may request that students be charged for printing to any lab printer connected to a Novell print queue. The Computer Center will pay the department each month based on the number of pages printed, at a rate 25% less than the actual charge to students. The difference helps cover overhead and the initial free printing that students are allowed. Credits for poor quality printing are solely the responsibility of the lab manager and/or department.

Miscellaneous

1. The computers and the users of all labs must adhere to all other applicable policies, like the Acceptable Use Policy, UNET's authentication policy, and so on, to be enforced in the Computer Center's usual manner.
2. All of these guidelines are arbitrary and capricious, and subject to change without notice. In cases of dispute, the decision of the Computer Center Director shall be final.