IRIS

The new EECS website was launched today. There is a home EECS page at eecs.berkeley.edu as well as division home pages at cs.berkeley.edu and ee.berkeley.edu. A few of the many improvements include:

* More modern and professional appearance
* Streamlined and consistent navigation
* Increased use of images across the site to emphasize the culture of EECS
* Clear, easy-to-find information for our current and potential industrial connections
* Content Management in Drupal so that content can be updated directly on the site

This has been a year-and-a-half-long project that started by selecting a vendor (Kalamuna) to manage the discovery, design, and implementation process. The previous site had grown organically to a considerable complexity and size, requiring a complete overhaul. A large portion of the work has been to trim down content that was redundant, obsolete, or unnecessary. We hope to foster continuous improvement with the new implementation. If you have feedback about content, navigation, or feel, please let us know at webteam@eecs.berkeley.edu

I’d like to thank several people for their Herculean efforts:

* Chairs Tsu-Jae, Mike, and Randy, for their vision, leadership, and for dedicating resources to make this project a priority.
* Jan Pardoe for leading the project and keeping the vendors busy at all times and within budget.
* Maggie Crowley for managing and adapting massive amount of content and creating new content where needed.
* All the department staff and everyone else who helped out with content in their areas. We couldn���t have done it without you.

Due to low usage in recent years, combined with a desire to improve overall wireless network performance by removing unused networks, we will be retiring the EECS-Guest and EECS-Robonet wireless networks on July 29. The AirBears network was retired on July 1.

We have already retired EECS-Guest in buildings where it was not being used, and service will be ended in all locations on the 29th. Please use the CalVisitor wireless network for guests without EECS or AirBears accounts. If you are having trouble using CalVisitor, or have guests which require applications that don’t work on CalVisitor, please contact us.

If you are a member of an academic group in Cory Hall that relies on EECS-Robonet but has managed to slip under our radar, please contact us for alternate solutions.

Finally, on the first of July, we followed campus IT’s lead in ceasing to broadcast the legacy AirBears wireless network, which was formally retired in August 2015. All AirBears users should now be using AirBears2.

If you have questions, comments, or concerns about any of the above service retirements, please contact us at help@eecs.berkeley.edu.

Our primary machine room, 290 Soda, has lost battery backup power, due to the explosion of one or more batteries in the APC cabinet. These batteries were recently installed (May, 2016); building staff are coordinating warranty coverage and replacement.

No systems were affected by the loss of battery backup, but at this time all systems in 290 Soda are fully reliant on building power. This includes many IRIS and Instructional systems and services.

We will update this News item with the expected timeline of replacing the battery backup, as that information becomes available.

Replacement of batteries may take a week or more, depending on availability from the vendor.
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