MCU - 4/19/07

Tonight at 5:36pm the entire MCU had a major hiccup. I am not sure if it was purely an MCU thing or if the whole network had a problem. What I do know is that the conferences for both Sam and I totally shut down and reset. All the calls were hung up, but the conferences were also ended. Normally, this can only happen if the entire MCU resets, so it is possible that the MCU in the library lost power for a second. The strange part is that the MCU did not appear to reset. There was no downtime, it just booted all the members of the conferences and set every conference to idle. Very strange night.

 
Ag104 Scan Converter

The scan converter in Ag104 pitched a fit today. I am not sure what the cause of the problem was, but the result was that the scan converter would power up, but the system was not sending the signal to the control room. The big indicator was that the menu on the scan converter was not showing up. I tried to power it off and then back on, but that had no effect. It turns out that you need to go around to the back of the unit and unplug it fully for it to initiate a full reset. After that was done, the scan converter began working normally again.

(And a big "thank you!" to Daryl for figuring that out.)

 
Aberdeen Video/Audio Connection, connects at 384 and slides down to 192 with in 10 - 12 minutes. The last 4 times Ag 104 & AB have connected for the PLSC 547 class. The audio has become unstable, we'll wait small bit of time for it to clear up. It doesn't clear up, I disconnect and reconnect. A pattern, a clue has appeared, the audio has become unstable at 9:56 or 9:57 am PST, the last 3 times. Paula

 
Ag 104 - AB, 9:30 - 10:20, 2/12, Mon & 2/14, Wed. Aberdeen students complained that the audio was breaking up both days. I waited for the audio to clear and it didn't so I disconnected and reconnected. On the 14th, I had to reconnect twice before the audio would clear. The audio stayed stable after the reconnections. ph

 
LCSC's Doc Cam

We had problems with LCSC's doc cam again today. Basically the same problems that we had before with the camera shot appearing to be attempting to reload every few seconds. The normal LCSC operator was sick today, so we didn't have anyone on hand that could attempt a fix. I will contact LCSC and see if they have any ideas for how to fix the problem.

 
20077400, DOE Dept Mtg. Ed 103, B448, IF4, (Ed 103 to Bridge)
This morning, I was unable to add B448 to the conference. I opened B448 webpage, to check if the unit was on, it was. I called from Boise to Ed 103 and it connected fine. ph

 
Aberdeen

The connection rate at Aberdeen hasn't been steady for the last few days. Both Friday (2/2/07) and today the connection speed would begin at 384 kbps and the drop down to 192 kbps within 15 minutes. In both conferences, Aberdeen was the main site, so the rate shouldn't be dropping based on use alone. Perhaps the network is overloaded, but it may be something to keep an eye on.

 
Pocatello SBDC

I was unable to connect the Pocatello site (70.58.63.147) to the video conference this morning (IWC248, CDA1, and Pocatello). Each time I attempted to connect, it would look like a solid connection for about 30 seconds, then all the connection rates would drop to zero. The call would actually stay connected, but no data would pass between us. I called the Pocatello SBDC and worked with a man named Dave to try to fix it, but I was unsuccessful. I even tried to have him call me, but we still had the same problem even when he initiated the call.

Dave said that this has been a recurring problem for them.

 
Fax machine test in Ed103.

Harold just sent me another fax and it seems to work fine now. Not sure what the problem was before. Hopefully we just had a little user error and this is not a symptom of a real problem.

 
Connection between LCSC, WSU, and Ed103 on 1/31/07 (9 - 10:15am)

25 minutes into the class (9:25am) LCSC lost connection to WSU and could not re-establish it. I am not sure what was attempted to solve the problem (LCSC and WSU were doing talking because WSU is the bridge). After a few minutes they decided to attempt an ISDN call to UI and then have us bridge to WSU.

NOTE: Apparently it is not possible to dial ISDN into the system while a 768 call is active. I thought it would still be possible, so I stayed connected to WSU, but LCSC couldn't get into us. My thought was that the system would dial down the current call to accept the new call, but this does not seem to be the case. Either the system will not accept new calls when the current call is 768 or the system will not accept ISDN calls while an IP call is already established. (I will try some further testing at 12 today.)

Anyway, Chris from WSU called me just before 9:40 with Lawrence also on the line. I hung up my connection to WSU and then Lawrence dialed straight into me with no problems. As soon as he was in I dialed in WSU (using 134.121.239.191) and the class was rolling again.

One additional problem popped up too, Harold from LCSC was unable to fax anything to me for some reason. I was able to fax from here to the main office (on campus), and they could fax back to me, but Harold could not reach me. It is possible that the fax machine will not accept off campus calls, but that is just a speculation. I will talk with Harold after the class ends and see if he can attempt another fax.

 
ULEND Conf, Jeb 111, Utah Telehealth Bridge & MCU 1.
First Meeting today Friday 1/19/07. We were not able to connect into the conference.
Utah will need to dial into us. The Utah disconnected from our bridge about 1/2 hour after the meeting began, I called Pat Bryner to reconnect us. 801-585-2426. I did tell Pat for our future meetings that she could call into MCU 1 from 10:50 on.

 
Notes, re: testing for NEZP 102, Spring 2007.
WSU says we have to connect at 768.
We do not have to change our gatekeeper to WSU's. Hooray!
Testing went fine, here is the protocal for Spring 2007.
(Chris will work up a back up plan that we'll test when he's ready)

Ed 103 will dial into WSU, 07058, 768 kkb, and LAN.
the other sites will dial into WSU in the same way.