With exams and papers quickly approaching, students in residence are becoming increasingly irritated with the ongoing internet service and maintenance outages occurring with ResNet.
ResNet is the network internet service provided to the residences on campus.
Since the first outage notice on October 20, 2013, students have been dealing with recurring inconveniences when it comes to using the internet.
Christopher Russel, York’s director, ICT Infrastructure and information security officer, explained in an email that in summer 2013 the university began a large renewal of the internet infrastructure. Due to performance issues mid-October, they have implemented a series of changes to minimize the downtime of the service.
Russel says the initial attempt to address the performance issues on October 20 failed due to unexpected software issues, which then required a different approach that necessitated additional work and planned service outages.
Unfortunately, despite the changes, students are still experiencing problems with ResNet service.
First-year communication studies student Sabrina Fields, who lives in Stong Residence, says her internet was out for a total of 10 days and had to personally go down and ask for a technician to come in and fix the service.
“We never quite knew when things were going to be done and it was really frustrating,” says Fields.
Fields also notes she could hear the sounds of the maintenance work for the service all the way from the tenth floor of Stong.
Russel says that the works were performed during periods of very low utilization, some of it during reading week and between 6:30 a.m. to 8 a.m. in order to minimize impact.
With deadlines looming during this busy time of year and no campus support during the weekends, students hope that these outages will not affect their studies or success as they wrap up the semester.
Students experiencing issues at the Keele residences can report them to the UIT helpdesk via email at inres@yorku.ca or phone 416-736-2100 ext 5561. There is also a problem reporting form available on the InRes website.
Devon MacPherson
Contributor
