The first phase of a "high availability" upgrade to the campus network will result in a network outage to a number of City Campus buildings on Sunday, May 11 from 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. Information Technology Services will install a new distribution router that will increase bandwidth and redundancy to campus buildings. This is the first in a series of network distribution upgrades to be completed in summer 2014. By the end of the summer, bandwidth to all City campus locations will double. Additional project phases will continue on both City and East campuses through next year. By the end of 2015, UNL will increase its internet capacity through commodity vendors and connections to consortiums Internet2 and OmniPop.
"The high availability project recognizes that the network is a lifeline for the University to the rest of the world," says Jim Hlava, Network Manager. The new distribution points will have built-in fail-over mechanisms and will be geographically dispersed throughout campus. Dual strands of fiber optic cable run to each building providing more bandwidth and redundancy. Buildings that currently receive 1GB bandwidth, will see it increase to 2GB. High-demand locations that currently have 10GB connections will receive 20GB.
"Our primary goal is to increase the bandwidth to every campus building and strengthen the core redundancy of the network in the case of a disaster and reduce the risk of individual equipment failure," says Kent Eitzmann, Network Architect. The goal, according to Hlava is to create a "fault-tolerant environment".
"When you design a network," adds Hlava. "You have to allow for what can go wrong. Equipment can overheat, software can have a bug, a fiber can get cut. Our network will be better equipped to respond to those problems and continue to run without the institution grinding to a halt."
The following buildings will experience an outage on May 11:
All wired and wireless networking in these locations will be impacted by this work unless noted otherwise. In addition Energy Management (EMCS), CCTV, Alarms, Door Access will function, but will not have administrative access while the work is being performed.
▪ Oldfather Hall
▪ Memorial Stadium East,West,North (including CB3 & APL) – Big10 Network not affected
▪ Hawks Championship Center
▪ Haymarket Park (Big10 Network not affected)
▪ Stadium Parking (including Athletic Ticket Office)
▪ Champions Club
▪ Schorr Center (direct connections to Internet2 and PKI are NOT affected)
▪ Manter Hall
▪ Hamilton Hall
▪ Andrews Hall
▪ Burnett Hall
▪ 501 Building
▪ Avery Hall
▪ Architecture Hall
▪ Bessey Hall
▪ Behlen/Brace
▪ Hewitt Place
▪ Morrill Hall
▪ Pinnacle Bank Arena (only connections on UNL network affected, Big10 Network not affected)
For additional information, please contact the UNL Operations Center at 402-472-5653 operator@unl.edu