babsblog

survey

Tech Support Through the Ages

I don't think any more needs to be said.

horizon

here's my horizon report!

End of an era

Jack Ziegler turned off the last VAX and Alpha in our VMS cluster. It took Information Technology years to decommission VMS. Every time we got close, some department still had use for it.

The VAX played an important part in my life. It's how I met my husband, and most of my other friends (like Julie, Christine, Jim and Andru). Yes, that's pretty geeky, I admit. My friend Julie turned me on to Cafe Vax, a bulletin board of sorts using VAX Notes. It was run by Tim, who also authored the widely acclaimed "VAX for Virgins" and hosted many Cafe Vax f2f gatherings. And that's where I met Courtney.

The first thing I remember hearing about Courtney was from Julie: "You should meet Courtney - he wore my lipstick!"

Web Accessibility & Search Engine Optimization

here's an article on ALA that describes another of the many beneficial side effects of designing web sites to meet accessibility standards.

http://www.alistapart.com/articles/accessibilityseo

Guilt Free

Thanks to the CSU Board of Trustees recent informational release, CSU Trustees Unveil Plan to Make Employee Compensation More Competitive with Other Universities, I will no longer suffer twangs of guilt when I hear faculty and students complain about SSU MPPs (of which I am one) being overpaid.

According to the California Postsecondary Education Commission, CSU faculty salaries lag 13.1 percent behind the CSU’s 20 “comparison institutions.” At the same time, CSU executive salaries are 49.5 percent lower than peers at these institutions. The CSU is having a difficult time recruiting and retaining CSU faculty and executives because of the salary differences. In addition, non-faculty employees in the CSU have salary lags ranging between 0 percent and 47 percent.

We know the pigeons didn't do it

No, it's not Photoshopped.

The university was greeted by this smiling face this morning....

...and then about noon I was being asked by the University Police as to whether or not my webcam images are cached anywhere. Luckily for the happy prankster, they are not.

Christine took the picture - thanks!

Anonymous Complaints

OK, don't you hate when someone complains anonymously? I answer the webmaster@sonoma.edu email, and every so often someone sends in an anonymous complaint. There are three reasons why I really don't like these.

1. Usually, the complaint is vague about details. Because it's anonymous, I can't write back and ask for specifics, without which I CAN'T FIX whatever the problem might have been.
2. Sometimes the writer has a valid point, but because he or she didn't have the guts to stand behind their opinion, it's too easy for the institution (me, my boss, or whatever department might be responsible for the area complained about) to ignore, dismiss, or otherwise disregard the issue. Especially when the complaint is vague.
3. In direct opposition with reason 2, sometimes the institution will give more attention to a complaint than it really deserves, seemingly BECAUSE it is anonymous.

I just don't get it.

Four Yellow Cars Day

Reading a new book... today is definitely a four yellow cars in a row day.

JFC!

OK, I've turned off comments now.

Isn't it amazing how much time people will put into spamming a site (with no traffic but me and the people I demo movable type to) with infinite penis enlargement ads?

All I can say is JFC!

Redesign Done!

the new campus home page is up, and though some things still need tweaking, and the CSS needs to be cleaned up, it's officially "done." It all validates for XHTML 1.0, CSS 2 and Section 508.

We've had lots of feedback from the campus community, and almost everyone seems to like it. Only got one negative, kinda cryptic comment, and that was from a fellow SSUIT employee. What's the deal with that? I would never tell one of the phone guys that I don't like the color of the voicemail waiting button after 1.5 years of major overhaul. grrrr.

site redesign

No doubt about it.

Ok, get on with it already

So, I've been pretty busy lately. A few of the big ones that seem to be always on my mind:

WebCT Upgrade
University home page and top level page redesign
Intro to DW training
Intro to CSS training
Resource 25 implementation - and upgrade
Co-chairing the campus web team

Plus there's the few dozen projects listed on my whiteboard so I won't forget them altogether. And the daily "hey, can you do me a favor" mini-projects that I have a hard time saying "no" to.

Anyway, my point is I haven't had a chance to start this blog. This blog, which I asked Dustin to set up for me almost 2 months ago, has been sitting here entryless. Haven't even played with the CSS.

So here's my first entry. Let's see how long it takes to get to number 2.