10/11/2024
As summer cast its tranquil spell over campus, the Information Technology Services (ITS) team worked hard behind the scenes, implementing crucial updates and improvements to ensure a smooth start to the fall semester. Some of the highlights appear below:
110 Classroom Technology and Support
Two years ago, ITS started working with various departments across the university to exchange ideas on how to convert our decentralized general smart classroom model (referred to as 110 rooms) to a centralized model — the purpose being to standardize technology and improve technologies, collaboration and support services.
Toward this initiative, ITS upgraded the AV equipment in over 250 general/shared classrooms. This included replacing PCs; providing new and refreshed software images; updating AMX panels; and upgrading controllers, switchers and audio components. Perhaps most significant was the complete AV upgrade of 23 heavily used classrooms in Mazur Hall. To finance these upgrades, ITS created a projected six-year technology budget plan.
ITS has also since assumed support for 163 additional general classrooms across six schools and colleges, bringing our total number of centralized rooms to 264.
Finally, during the beginning of the fall semester, ITS quickly scrambled to bring additional classrooms up to current technology standards by replacing outdated computers, monitor displays, projectors, cables, switchers, and controllers, and reprogramming the AMX panels.
TUSafe Rally Points Maps
ITS partnered with the Department of Public Safety to incorporate rally point maps into the TUSafe app. This integration provides students and employees with easy access to important information, helping them navigate to their designated rally point during a building evacuation. These rally point maps are also available on route.temple.edu under Public Safety. See below for direct links:
TUmobile
ITS migrated the TUmobile mobile app to to Ellucian Experience, providing single-sign-on access to many TUportal applications and services. If you haven’t downloaded the app, now is a great time to do so! Future plans include improved integrations with TUportal, enhanced notifications, and a unified calendar view. To learn more, see our TUmobile webpage.
Drupal 10
ITS and Strategic Marketing and Communications (SM+C) continued to migrate school, college and departmental websites to Drupal 10, with over 20 websites successfully transitioned by the summer. The new platform offers enhanced security, better performance, and modern tools for creating dynamic and engaging content. The upgrade is a key part of Temple's long-term strategy to align our brand, content strategy and user experience across our various websites.
Looking ahead, we plan to migrate an additional 50 websites by October 2025. While the process was not without its challenges, particularly around ensuring seamless content migration and minimizing disruption, the collaboration between ITS and SM+C has been key for successfully overcoming these hurdles.
Salary Information System
ITS created a new application for HR called the Salary Increase System (SIS) to support the annual increase and bonus process for employees. The application, which replaces a manual process using spreadsheets , enables departments to set wage increases and provide bonuses for Non-Bargaining and AFSCME employees.
Follett
ITS worked with Follett (the company that has replaced Barnes and Noble as our bookstore vendor) to integrate their website with our Banner system. The project included standing up a new server for accessing our Temple's course data information. The resulting new bookstore website now enables students to obtain an individualized list of textbooks for their upcoming classes.
OWLcard Office
Over the summer, the Owlcard Office relocated to the Technology Support Center (TSC) in the TECH Center - Room 106. Our hope is that the new location provides a better experience by enabling students and employees to get technical assistance with other issues while also getting help with their OWLcard.
Network Upgrades
ITS performed the following network upgrades to prepare for the semester:
Main Campus
- Replaced production F5 load balancers with a newer version, improving total cost of ownership, security and automation over previous systems. Load balancers are used to distribute network traffic across multiple servers to improve the availability, performance. and reliability of applications and services.
- Upgraded Radware DefensePro to the latest software version. This application inspects enterprise data traffic and ensures no malicious traffic is allowed to pass onto the enterprise network.
- Performed the following wireless network upgrades:
- Upgraded the servers supporting wireless authentication.
- Upgraded wireless controllers to the latest software version and migrated nearly 6,500 wireless access points to these controllers.
Temple Health System
- Replaced four Extreme Networks edge switches at Temple University Hospital (Parkinson Pavilion).
ITS Website
On the ITS website, we replaced the ITS Teams section with a new section called ITS Service Areas, which highlights the nine major services we provide to the university. We also revamped the ITS in the News section to include articles from within Temple as well as external publications. Both of these sections appear under Who We Are in the main navigation menu.