When Caitlin Winters ’05 sat down at a local Internet café in Florence, Italy last semester to register for classes, she often ran into a big problem-StagWeb didn’t work.
Winters is not alone. Students studying abroad in Europe cannot access their e-mail accounts during the middle of the day due to the time difference and the three hours StagWeb shuts down for repairs each night.
“We couldn’t get access to the website until 2 p.m., which is when most of us are in class,” said Winters. “It made for a difficult situation, especially during registration. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much we could do. I didn’t contact the university because I thought my complaints would fall on deaf ears.”
However, upcoming changes will make the StagWeb system accessible 24 hours a day, potentially making life a little easier for Fairfield students both here and abroad.
“During the next several months, Administrative Computing will be implementing a newer version of StagWeb … this will provide the university community true 24-7 access to StagWeb,” said Kevin Clancy, account executive for Computing and Network Services.
The change will occur between now and June, and will be available to students as soon as the new version of the system performs well in a test environment, according to Clancy.
Currently, the StagWeb system shuts down between 3 a.m. and 6 a.m., while the system administrators back up system data. However, a change to “hot” backups will allow system administrators to back up data while keeping StagWeb online.
The change will be especially helpful to students studying abroad in Europe who lose access to registration information and e-mail during the middle of the day.
“It was irritating that other students from other home universities were able to check their school e-mail at any hours, while we had to make it something that fit into our schedule,” said Winters.
However, StagWeb administrators believe that the updated system will solve the problem.
“Hot backups allow the StagWeb system to be backed up while the system is live. This might not seem significant to those that use it on campus, but to students abroad it would be a significant improvement,” Clancy added.
“Students abroad have a unique challenge regarding the time of day that they use StagWeb. For example, a student in London, England trying to access StagWeb between 8 a.m. and 11 a.m. will not be able to due to the backup procedures running from 3 a.m. to 6 a.m. EST. Currently, when the StagWeb is backed up each night, the StagWeb application is brought offline. When the system is offline, the user community cannot access StagWeb. Hot backups will eliminate this issue,” said Clancy.
Backing up computer systems is a common practice within the management information industry, according to Clancy. During these backups system information is stored off-site so that in the event of a disaster, such as fire or flooding, the data could be restored back onto the computer system.
Students on campus see the switch to hot backups as a necessary change.
“I didn’t see why it was necessary to shut [StagWeb] down every night for repairs when other universities have access to their e-mail throughout the day,” said Lauren Fedechena ’05.
“The change will help out,” said Fedechena. “It makes sense to have 24-hour access to our accounts.”
Winters said the improvement to the system will solve the problems encountered by many students who are abroad.
“I wish [this] … had been put into effect while I was in Italy, but I am happy to hear that they are going to do it within the next few months so the future study abroad students will benefit from this change,” said Winters. “I know it will make their time abroad a lot less frustrating.”
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