In early February, ITS retired its oldest running production system—the Uniqname Service (UNS). Implemented in 1992, UNS was running on outdated hardware with an old homegrown “UMCE Linux” operating system. Due to high risk, the system had not been shut down or upgraded since 2012. “We were concerned about the fragility and technical debt associated with the homegrown… Read More »
U-M has one of the largest alumni networks that spans the state and the globe. Until recently, accessing this robust network often relied upon Excel spread sheets, paper lists, making LinkedIn connections, or through serendipitous meetings—not exactly a convenient or reliable system. Frequently, students asked staff at the University Career Center (UCC): “Is there an easy way to… Read More »
On January 30, the university held its first Privacy@Michigan symposium. Celebrating the 10th anniversary of International Data Privacy Day, the event featured an interdisciplinary group of U-M faculty and researchers who addressed top privacy-related—and threatening—issues in an era when the very notion has gotten complicated. The event was sponsored jointly by the U-M School of Information (UMSI), and… Read More »
Thanks in part to a barcoding system developed by Health Information Technology & Services, C.S. Mott Children’s and Von Voigtlander Women’s Hospital (C&W) virtually eliminated the misadministration of breast milk to infants in their care. C&W is home to the first 24/7 formula and breast milk preparation room in a pediatric hospital nationwide. Opened in 2011, the Milk… Read More »
Over 560 IT staff from U-M’s four campuses filled the Michigan League this past November to develop skills, form and strengthen working relationships, and showcase how their work contributes to moving U-M forward as part of the 2017 Michigan IT Symposium. After the event, 216 attendees provided their feedback on what worked well and what they’d like to… Read More »
The William Davidson Institute has created a “virtual exchange” of young people across cultures and continents in an eight-week challenge of social entrepreneurship.
A new Identity and Access Management (IAM) service is a gamechanger in helping the Alumni Association fulfill its mission to connect alumni with services that nurture an ongoing relationship with the university. “Using social login allows the Alumni Association to overcome the single biggest barrier for providing alumni access to our online services and alumni benefits,” says Andre… Read More »
For several years, Information and Technology Services (ITS) offered Amazon Web Services (AWS) at U-M as its sole cloud computing IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service) offering. That is changing. U-M recently signed enterprise agreements to offer Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform (GCP). The addition of these industry leading vendors provides a strong foundation of cloud computing solutions, and will enable… Read More »
Something exciting is happening at Michigan Medicine. And U-M patients are benefiting. In recent months, the screening rate for depression symptoms in patients who had diagnosis of depression in last 12 months rose from 10 percent to nearly 70 percent. The rate of lung cancer screenings in smokers doubled. And the hepatitis C screening rate improved fivefold among… Read More »
During the summer of 2017, in lieu of a more traditional “summer reads” program, the College of Literature, Science and the Arts launched an experiment in online, interactive, and collaborative explorations of citizenship and diversity in a digital age. Because issues of free speech, safe spaces, inclusion, intellectual diversity, and identity-based marginalization continue to create divisions and challenges… Read More »
As one of the largest health care systems in the world, communication to the more than 26,000 Michigan Medicine employees is not always easy. “As an organization, we are continuously looking for new channels to communicate important news and updates to employees,” said Kathleen McCool, employee communications manager with the Michigan Medicine Department of Communication. “Email is not… Read More »
We are coming up quickly on the winter break, with families gathered and children out of school. With that in mind, it might be fun to have some some (slightly eccentric?) options for family activities and young folk distractions. Even better if these are options that promote learning, or just understanding more about what the old folks do… Read More »
The UM-Dearborn Career Center hosted Girls Are IT! STEAM JAM 2017 on October 18. This half-day workshop targeted 50 middle school (grade 6-8) girls from Detroit Public Schools Community District. UM-Dearborn, Detroit Public Schools Community District, and Ford Motor partnered to deliver educational opportunities in STEAM for these students. These highly committed and cohesive teams worked together to… Read More »
On October 14, 2017, more than 3,700 women and girls dressed as the iconic Rosie the Riveter—dark blue work clothes, red socks, and the effervescent, red-and-white polka-dot bandana. Together, they set a new world record of the most people dressed as Rosie the Riveter gathered in one place. Kudos to all Michigan IT staff who participated! Here’s what some… Read More »
The first thing you notice when entering West Ann Arbor-Parkland Plaza health center might be the welcome desk, floor-to-ceiling windows, or charming artwork. It probably isn’t the WiFi access points, label printers, or network cables. Randy Smith, a network architect with Health Information Technology & Services (HITS), knows how integral that technology is to the health center’s day-to-day… Read More »
The first day of class is one of the biggest days on the IT calendar. Lots of planning and preparation are done to get ready for thousands to descend on campus—will all of our systems handle the increased volume? Well, this year the first day of class was quieter than days past, thanks to the generous support of… Read More »
ITS installed fiber optic infrastructure at Mcity that enables cutting-edge transportation research, not to mention the vast amount of data it generates.
From July to September of this year, University of Michigan-Flint ITS, supported by the U-M Information Assurance Office (IA), conducted an awareness campaign on campus that resulted in a significant decrease in the number of users who fell for simulated phish emails. In addition to IA support, UM-Flint ITS groups that were also instrumental in this process included… Read More »
Historically the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts (LSA) used its public web site for some content that ideally would have gone to department- or college-level intranet sites, if those sites had existed. This past summer, using the same web content management software as our public web site — Adobe Experience Manager (AEM) — LSA Web Services… Read More »
Registration is open for the 2017 Michigan IT Symposium, November 20–21, 2017. The event, which offers a great opportunity for networking with peers and making new connections, will take place at the Michigan League on the Ann Arbor campus The 2017 symposium will focus on how IT work at Michigan is transforming with the proliferation of cloud technologies… Read More »