Friday, May 31, 2013

***RESOLVED*** Brief Internet Outage Planned for Morning of 6/4/2013

WHAT: One of our Internet Service Providers (ISP) will be performing brief maintenance on 6/4/2013 at approximately 5 am.  The maintenance is expected to last an hour; disruption in services is expected to last for only a short portion of this time (~5-15 minutes).

WHEN: 06/04/2013 Duration: 1 Hour

WHERE: All campus Internet will be impacted

Current Status: Open

Description: We received notice from one of our Internet Service Providers that there will be planned maintenance for the network in our area on 6/4 from 5 am to 6 am.  All Internet access will be impacted for a brief period during the maintenance; we expect that the outage should be brief, ~5-15 minutes, but it may be more or less.

Service(s) Impacted: Campus Network

Resolution:  The work was completed within the expected maintenance window.  Total downtime was ~ one minute for each affected network.  If you notice any irregularities or problems with network or Internet connections, please contact the Help Desk at 253-535-7525.


Check http://www.plu.edu/status/ for periodic updates.

Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Sakai Unavailable for Maintenance on Thur., May 30, 6AM

*** UPDATE *** May 30, 6:11AM - Sakai is back online. The planned maintenance is complete.

*** UPDATE *** May 30, 6:00AM - Sakai is currently offline for planned maintenance. The Sakai Support team is working to restore this service by 6:30AM (if not before).

WHAT:  Sakai Unavailable for Maintenance 

WHEN:  05/30/13 Duration:  6:00AM - 6:30AM

Description:  On Thursday, May 30, Sakai will be out of service from 6:00AM to 6:30AM for weekly maintenance. Please plan accordingly. If you have any questions or concerns please email sakai@plu.edu.

Service(s) Impacted: Sakai

Estimated Time to Resolution or Next Update:  Thur., May 30, 6:30AM

Check http://www.plu.edu/status/ for periodic updates.

Friday, May 17, 2013

***Resolved*** Intermittent Network Issues Reported

WHAT: At approximately 3pm the Help Desk began to receive reports of issues with network connectivity in various buildings across campus.  

WHEN: 05/17/13

WHERE:  All personal devices (laptops, phones using wireless, game stations) will be affected as well as most Academic spaces (library, labs, classrooms)

Current Status: Resolved

Description: 

Resolution: 8:50 PM: The internet service provider has isolated an issue that was causing service interruptions throughout the region.

Update: 4:30 pm: The network connectivity issues have improved, but there is still an issue being dealt with by one of our Internet Service Providers (ISP).  Users may experience momentary interruptions throughout the evening as the ISP works to resolve the issue in full.

If conditions worsen, please contact the Help Desk immediately at 253-535-7525.

Update 3:39 pm:  We have narrowed down the connection issue to a problem with one of our campus Internet connections.  Networking is currently working with the Service Provider to identify the issue and is working towards a solution as quickly as possible.  We will provide continual updates on this issue as more information arrives.


Original Message: At approximate 3 pm today, the Help Desk began receiving reports of network interruptions from various buildings on campus.  Networking was alerted and is currently investigating these issues.

Users who are experiencing network issues are advised to contact the Help Desk at 253-535-7525.  Please report:
  • Current location
  • Whether you are connecting wirelessly or wired
We will continue to investigate the issue and post an update at this time.

Service(s) Impacted:Campus Network

Estimated Time to Resolution or Next Update: 4:30 pm


Root Cause / Continuous Improvement:

The issue experienced on Friday was the result of a problem with one of our Internet Service Providers.  At approximately 3 pm on Friday, the Help Desk along with Networking began to investigate issues with Internet connectivity as we received reports from around campus.  After determining that the issue was likely not with any PLU equipment, we proceeded to contact the ISP which handled the connections being affected.  During out communication with the ISP, a stop-gap was put in place to resolve the majority of issues with connectivity, and we declared the issue resolved at that time.

For any possible future events, we will do our best to improve our response speed to network connectivity issues.  The Help Desk was grateful for all callers who assisted by providing us with the requested information.  For future network issues, we will continue to use the PLUHelpDesk Twitter account as a primary means of communication.  (As normal network communication may not be possible).  We strongly advise that users subscribe to our Twitter feed.  Subscribing is simple and does not require a Twitter account.  This account is for informational posts only and will not post any non-status related updates.

Additional Info:  Our ISP informed us that the issue was the result of a configuration issue which resulted in what is known as a broadcast storm (wikipedia).  This resulted in a 55 minute outage.  The ISP is working to update and improve the broadcast storm detection tools and to investigate why the error was not reported quicker.  


Check http://www.plu.edu/status/ for periodic updates.

Wednesday, May 15, 2013

Sakai Unavailable for Maintenance on Fri., May 17, 6AM

*** UPDATE *** May 17, 6:11AM - Sakai is back online. The planned maintenance is complete.

*** UPDATE *** May 17, 6:00AM - Sakai is currently offline for planned maintenance. The Sakai Support team is working to restore this service by 6:30AM (if not before).

WHAT:  Sakai Unavailable for Maintenance

WHEN:  05/17/13 Duration:  6:00AM - 6:30AM

Description:  On Friday, May 17, Sakai will be out of service from 6:00AM to 6:30AM for weekly maintenance. Please plan accordingly. If you have any questions or concerns please email sakai@plu.edu.

Service(s) Impacted:  Sakai

Estimated Time to Resolution or Next Update:  Fri., May 17, 6:30AM

Check http://www.plu.edu/status/ for periodic updates.

Saturday, May 11, 2013

***Resolved*** Banweb (Banner) Inaccessible, Error 503

WHAT: Users trying to access Banner via http://banweb.plu.edu are receiving an error 503 when attempting to access the page.

WHEN: 05/11/13

Current Status: Resolved

Description: ***RESOLVED***  Banweb is now accessible once more.  We will continue to monitor the service to ensure its stability over the weekend.

At approximately 3:00 pm today, the Help Desk received reports of Banner being inaccessible.  Users going to the Banner website receive an error 503 Service Temporarily Unavailable.

We are diagnosing the issue currently.

Service(s) Impacted: Banner


Estimated Time to Resolution or Next Update:  6:00 pm

Root Cause / Continuous Improvement: The root cause of the service downtime is still being investigated.  We will post an update once we close the issue completely.



Check http://www.plu.edu/status/ for periodic updates.

Friday, May 10, 2013

***Resolved*** Google Drive Currently Inoperative

WHAT: Google Drive is currently malfunctioning.  This appears to affect all users.  We are beginning an investigation to determine the root cause of this issue.

WHEN: 05/10/13 

Current Status: Open

Description:  ***RESOLVED*** At approximately 12:20 pm, Drive became accessible once more.  We will keep an eye on the updates from Google to ensure there are no subsequent outages as a result of this issue, but for now we consider the problem resolved.  If you have any issues with accessing Google Drive, please contact the Help Desk at 253-535-7525.

Update 12:07 pm 5/10:  The Google Apps Status Dashboard has been updated by Google noting that there is an issue with the Drive service.  This would indicate that this is an issue at Google's level.  We will continue to post updates as they arrive.

Original Message:  At approximately 11:50 am today, the Help Desk received reports of Google Drive not working properly for PLU Gmail users.  The symptoms are as follows:
  • Page loads, but user files are not shown on page
We are currently investigating to determine the root cause of the issue, and are awaiting an update from Google to see if it is a service issue.

Service(s) Impacted: Google Apps

Workarounds: No Workarounds available at this time

Estimated Time to Resolution or Next Update: 2 pm

Root Cause / Continuous Improvement: The issue appears to be a problem with Google's servers.  Google is investigating and will post updates as the issue evolves.

Check http://www.plu.edu/status/ for periodic updates.

Thursday, May 9, 2013

Authentication to some online services unavailable on May 10, 6-8am

WHAT: Planned maintenance will result in intermittent disruptions to authentication for some online services.

WHEN: 05/10/2013  Duration: 6:00-8:00 AM

Current Status: Resolved

**UPDATE** The maintenance was performed, and all services should be restored.

Description: On May 10, 2013, there will be intermittent disruptions in authentication to several online services while planned maintenance is performed. During these disruptions, it will not be possible to log in to the online services listed below, but in most cases users will be able to continue using the services if they have already logged in.

If you find that you are unable to log into one of the online services listed below during this maintenance window, please wait 15 minutes and try again.

Service(s) Impacted: Sakai, Web Help Desk, ePass Tools, Personal Web sites (community.plu.edu), DSpace, Online Search & Directory, some protected resources on www.plu.edu


Check http://www.plu.edu/status/ for periodic updates.

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Sakai Unavailable for Maintenance on Fri., May 3, 6AM

*** UPDATE *** May 3, 6:16AM - Sakai is back online. The planned maintenance is complete.

*** UPDATE *** May 3, 6:00AM - Sakai is currently offline for planned maintenance. The Sakai Support team is working to restore this service by 6:30AM (if not before).

WHAT:  Sakai Unavailable for Maintenance

WHEN:  05/03/13  Duration:  6:00AM - 6:30AM

Description:  On Friday, May 3, Sakai will be out of service from 6:00AM to 6:30AM for weekly maintenance. Please plan accordingly. If you have any questions or concerns please email sakai@plu.edu.

Service(s) Impacted:  Sakai

Estimated Time to Resolution or Next Update:  Fri., May 3, 6:30AM

Check http://www.plu.edu/status/ for periodic updates.