Technology Overview
Information technology plays a pivotal role in the research, instruction and learning within our field, and plays a lively role in the career prospects of our graduate students.
In recognition of these key roles, the SLIS technology staff is dedicated to providing students, faculty and staff with reliable access to advanced research computing systems and software.
The SLIS Technology Staff maintains a help system to help with common questions and difficulties.
In addition to providing access to Indiana University's central computing systems, we maintain our own Unix (Sun Solaris, Debian Linux, Apple Mac OS X) and Windows servers and workstations in order to offer the following to the SLIS community:
Computer Labs
There are 2 labs open to all members of the SLIS community, as well as 1 reserved for Ph.D. students:
- The Shepherd Lab in the SLIS Information Commons (LI002) has 17 Windows PCs and 6 machines running Apple's OS X.
- In the SLIS Information Commons there is a 28 station Mac OS X lab which is used for SLIS lab courses and is open for use by SLIS students when a class in not using it.
SLIS Technology Services
The SLIS Information staff provides and maintain a heterogenous mix of servers for staff, faculty and student use. SLIS maintains several Sun Solaris servers, a selection of Linux servers, several machines running Apple's OS X, and Windows Server machines.
Service and System highlights
Ella
Ella (ella.slis.indiana.edu) is the general web server and unix shell machine.
Ella provides an excellent workspace for technologies such as Java, Python,
Perl, PHP, XML, XSLT, PEAR, PostgreSQL, etc.
PostgreSQL
PostgreSQL accounts are available! Please send a request to root@slis.indiana.edu; be
sure to include your IU username, what the intended use is, how much space you think
you will need.
Network Files
- Home Directories
SLIS OS X systems have network home directories. - SMB
Solaris/Linux home directory access is provided as bl-slis-ella or maxixe.slis.indiana.edu.
Backups
Solaris home directories are scheduled for backups three times each
week. User data on Windows desktop computers, Windows scratch dirves,
OS X network homes, and OS X scratch drives are not on a backup system,
and the technology staff cannot retrieve, or assume responsibilty for,
data lost from these locations.
Printing
SLIS students are allotted 1500 pages each per semester (fall, spring, and summer) of printing on SLIS printers. The Ph.D. student allotment is 2000 pages per semester. Overage charges are at a rate equal to the cost of photocopying on a campus Self Service Copy Machine (Spring 2007 rate is $0.10 per page). Overages shall be billed at the end of the semester in which they are incurred.
This 1500 pages is in addition to the 1000 pages you can print in UITS STC labs (ie. the Undergraduate Library Services Information Commons). SLIS printing will count against your SLIS quota and UITS STC printing will count against your UITS quota. Either allotment can be checked at the STC Printing Services page.
More information on your UITS allottment is available from the STC: Standard Printing Allotments.
Printing in a Shared Environment
- Please limit the number and size of jobs sent to the printer.
- Print only one or two jobs at a time.
- The Undergraduate Services Information Commons has special facilities for large print jobs.
- Special Media printing
- Use envelpopes, resume paper, etc only in a Special I/O Facility.
- For transparency priniting, please visit COPIES & MORE at the Indiana Memorial Union.
- Do not attempt to reuse paper that has been in a printer.
- Should your print job not print in a timely manner, inform our consultant so that they may clear the queue. This is common with PDFs.
Computer Support
The information technology staff is here to help provide computing support to the school's students, faculty and staff. Technology consultants can be found in the SLIS Information Commons (LI002). System Support Specialists are also available for assistance.
System support requests should be sent to root@slis.indiana.edu This helps route requests in a timely manner.
Online Resources
The SLIS Technology staff maintains a SLIS specific help system; UITS hosts the IU Knowledge Base
Technology Workshops
The School of Library and Information Science periodically offers free, informal workshops on a variety of technical subjects. Future workshops will be announced on the SLIS-L listserv when they are available.
Hardware, software, and training from outside SLIS
UITS maintains a list of Deals and recommendations, computers, printers, modems, network cards, peripherals, telephones, pagers, cell phones, used hardware, departmental acquisitions.
IUware is a software distribution service for Indiana University students, faculty, and staff. IUware offers software for reading email and web browsing, as well as programs such as antivirus and office applications. Since the university has already paid for the relevant licenses through its many agreements with vendors, you may use the programs available through IUware for free as long as your affiliation with IU continues.
IUware is available via the web using IUware Online, and also on CD. You can access IUware Online by visiting: http://iuware.indiana.edu/
IT Training & Education offers award-winning STEPS workshops on more than 80 information technology topics. STEPS workshops are available on both the Indiana University Bloomington and IUPUI campuses, and are open to the IU community and the general public. STEPS are hands-on, instructor-led workshops in word processing, email, spreadsheets, databases, graphics, presentations, statistics, and browsing and publishing on the web. STEPS workshops range from introductory to advanced, and most last from 90 minutes to three hours each.
*Access may vanish once university computing account password is disabled. We reserve the right to remove accounts at any time without notice. Students not enrolled in a SLIS degree program may have ella accounts deleted if no longer enrolled in a SLIS course.
