November 22, 1999
Y2K: prepare for winter quarter now
By Jim Burns
So, with one month to go before the calendar turns to Year 2000, exactly how Y2K-safe
is the campus? Staff who have studied the issue--as well as the hundreds of thousands
of lines of the computer code that drive operating systems, applications, and files--believe
that all of the campus's primary computer systems will be up and fully functional
on January 1.
To be on the safe side, however, a small corps of UCSC employees will be on campus during the first weekend of the New Year, assessing the campus's power grid and testing UCSC's mission-critical computer systems.
As an additional backup, units that oversee such systems as the Student Information System, the Payroll-Personnel System, and the Financial Information System have developed contingency plans that will enable the campus to do business even if there are failures.
UCSC's Y2K Task Force is also reminding students, faculty, and staff to take a few steps to help ensure UCSC's smooth transition to the New Year:
- Students should remember to complete enrollment for winter classes (via phone
or Web) by the end of open enrollment on December 15, make a printout of their winter
2000 class schedule before leaving for the holiday season, and pay registration fees
by the December 15 deadline.
- Some faculty, staff, and students should also check in to make sure that the campus didn't sustain any major Y2K-related power problems before returning to campus for the beginning of the winter quarter on Monday, January 3.
Specifically, students who live on campus but will be out of the area in the days leading up to January 3 are asked to call 459-INFO or visit UCSC's Y2K Web site (y2k.ucsc.edu) between midmorning on Saturday, January 1, and their scheduled return time. Employees who live out of the Santa Cruz area (and may not know of any local power problems) are asked to do likewise.
The Y2K Web site also contains other related resources, including an informational flyer that students, faculty, and staff may print and keep in their possession over the holiday break. Contingency plans that would be in effect should the campus experience significant Y2K-related system failures are also available at the Web site.
KZSC radio (88.1 FM) will also carry reports of the campus's Y2K health during the first weekend of the New Year.
