Computing Services

Faculty and PhD Service Level Agreement (SLA):

Accounts:

Faculty will be provided with E-mail accounts and NT domain (i.e. Haas network) accounts when hired.
Faculty and PhD accounts have access to HCS services free of charge.
Research computing accounts will be provided upon request. Submit requests via the Help Desk at helpdesk@haas.berkeley.edu.
Accounts will expire upon termination of affiliation with Haas, although extensions may be granted to permit migration of data to another location.
Faculty accounts are expired only after receipt of written notification from the Dean's Office.
PhD accounts expire after receipt of written notification from the PhD Program Office.
Accounts and normal account passwords are set never to expire. Initial or replaced passwords assigned by HCS staff are set to automatically expire upon first use. Account password length must be a minimum of nine characters. Passwords are subjected to vulnerability testing once per month. The Password must not be detected by vulnerability checking. Accounts with passwords that fail the vulnerability check will be disabled after you are notified by email and phone. Guidelines for good passwords are found at http://groups.haas.berkeley.edu/HCS/howdoi/Password%20Guidelines.pdf

Account Compromise:

If you believe the security of your accounts has been compromised, contact the HelpDesk immediately. If HCS discovers that your accounts have been compromised, it will take action as appropriate, up to disabling the account. If such action is necessary, HCS will contact you by phone or voice-mail and will immediately work on the security problem until it is resolved.

Computer Virus Problems:

Stop using your computer. Call the HelpDesk immediately during staffed hours. If your call is made outside staffed hours, leave a voice message or e-mail.

Help Desk Hours:

Staffed Hours: Monday to Friday, 8:00 am to 5:00 pm.
Contact information:

Phone: (510) 642-0434 or 1-866-642-0434 (24/7 Voicemail)

E-mail

On-Line Access access (use your Haas NT account name and password to log on)

Getting Help from the Help Desk:

When a problem arises, faculty should contact the Haas Computing Services Help Desk (HCSHD) via phone, e-mail, On-Line Service Request System or in person.
Phone (510) 642-0434 Room S300M Haas School of Business.
HCSHD will require identifying information (Who, What, Where, When and How) to log and track service calls. HCSHD will begin the problem resolution process upon receipt of the call. HCSHD will attempt to correct the problem remotely. If remote repair is not successful HCSHD will prioritize call and assign to service personnel. The service call number will be supplied to Client. Assigned service personnel will contact the customer, set appointment, and keep customer and HCSHD informed of progress.

Help Desk Service Priorities and Escalation Procedure:

HCSHD will assign Call Priorities based on the following

#0 Server Crash - Production service or server down. Events affecting a department or the entire school. Events at this level will be immediately addressed and followed through until resolution. This Call Priority supersedes all other service tasks, assignments, and projects. (All available resources utilized pending resolution)
#1 Emergency, Customer or reported equipment unable to operate or perform tasks, no alternate procedure available. (Selected resources utilized pending resolution)
#2 Rush - Situation critical, key functions not operable, time sensitive
#3 Standard - Customer able to work at acceptable level awaiting service appointment (24 hour problem acknowledgement and response expected)
#4 Can Wait (3-day acknowledgement and response expected)
#5 Onhold - Awaiting approvals, third parties, system availability. (estimated completion date and status updates to be provided)

Service Desk Operator will determine Priority. All customers will be updated via the HCS web site, e-mail, or phone

HCS Service Goals:

To commence an informed diagnosis of problems with supported hardware and software upon notification.
To have the customer effectively operational as soon as possible.
For desktop systems, service reinstatement time depends on urgency and whether or not the hardware and software are supported or custom.
For an emergency or rush problem on a supported computing platform, the goal of HCS is to have the customer effectively operational within 1 hour of notification receipt.
For problems involving custom hardware or software, HCS provides service on a "best effort" basis without any time or cost guarantee. Such support may be outsourced at the customer’s expense.

Technical Support Troubleshooting Procedure:

Faculty research and course curriculum data are important assets and must be protected at all times. A faculty computing workstation is treated as a "Production" system and therefore the following procedures apply:

The Desktop Support technician will inform the customer of any and all changes to be performed before doing the work. The technician will inform the customer of any known potential risks associated with the changes and will give the customer the option to accept or decline the proposed changes before performing the work.

The customer must be available and willing to answer the technician’s questions before the work will proceed. The customer does not need to be physically present in order to have the work performed.

The technician has the right to decline a request of changes or modifications from a customer when it is the technician’s professional opinion that the requested work has too great a risk of failure or loss of data. In such cases, the problem will be referred to management for decision.

The technician will ensure that the customer’s system and data is adequately backed up before performing any changes that have associated potential risk. This includes, but is not limited to, emergency repair and/or boot disks, a verified ADSM workstation or HCS server backup set, a copy of the impacted directories or files, etc. The technician may defer the proposed changes until after such precautions have been taken.

Service requests for technical support services from external sources (e.g., Microsoft, SUN, etc.) are opened only for enterprise or departmental problems. Service requests for technical support services from external sources for customers are available at the customers expense.

Supported Hardware:

HCS will provide full support for Supported Hardware, that is, a hardware system:

purchased with the help of HCS,
completely configured and setup by the vendor and / or HCS including all components, and
purchased from one of several supported manufacturers (Dell, IBM, Gateway, or Sun).

HCS will deliver and connect to the network, supported hardware and upgrades within 3 business days of its arrival at HCS.
HCS supports hardware that is classified or functions as a workstation. If the hardware is of server class or functions as a server (e.g., providing some type of service, data, or access to multiple users), or does not reside in the HCS Computer Room and is not administered by the HCS System Administration Group, HCS provides service on a "best efforts" basis without any time or cost guarantee. Such support may be outsourced at the customer’s expense. Liability and interest in such a system is solely owned by the faculty person, organized research unit, or group.
Any machines running a UNIX or UNIX-like operating system are classified as a server.

Supported Software:

HCS provides the following services for Supported Software:

Software installation instructions and assistance.

Telephone assistance for standard features of the software.

One-on-one training via appointment.

Classes scheduled as required.

Notification to customers as new versions are made available and at least 90 days notice before a previous version is removed.

HCS supports software that is classified or designed to be operated on a workstation. If the software is of server class or functions as a server service (e.g., providing some type of service, data, or access to multiple users), and the software is not installed on an HCS server, HCS provides service on a "best efforts" basis without any time or cost guarantee. Such support may be outsourced at the customer’s expense. Liability and interest in such software is solely owned by the faculty person, organized research unit, or group.

Custom Computer Hardware and Software:

For a custom system (that is, a system that does not meet the criteria for a supported system) HCS provides service on a "best effort" basis without any time or cost guarantee. Such support may be outsourced at the customer’s expense.
For custom course-related software, HCS will assign an analyst to the faculty for software evaluation, selection, implementation, and (limited) training.

Custom Development:

Custom development is defined as a project and is subject to the same review and approval process.

Installing Hardware or Software on Existing Computers:

HCS will install all required replacement hardware and software on supported systems.
New hardware and software will be installed after review and acceptance of Custom Status implications by all concerned parties.

Upgrading Computers:

HCS will assist faculty with selecting, procuring and installing replacements for aging computers. Funding is the responsibility of the faculty member, organized research unit, or department.

Laptop Support:

Same as Supported Hardware and Supported Software. Additionally, the network interface and modem only if it is manufactured by 3COM and Xircom.
Although every effort is made to provide remote access to HCS resources, we cannot guarantee successful access from a particular site, due to site security constraints, incompatibilities, or Internet routing or network conditions.
Haas Computing Services will assist faculty members traveling abroad with setting up their laptops to be compatible with the AC power source of the country they will be visiting.

PDAs, Pen-Based Computers and Sub-Notebook Computers:

HCS does not support PDAs, pen-based computers and sub-notebooks. HCS does not support Windows CE. Such support may be outsourced at the customer's expense.

Home Computers:

HCS will perform services only if the customer brings the School-owned equipment to the school. HCS will not make house calls under any circumstances, and will not service personally owned computers.
HCS will arrange contract repair services for School-owned home computers at the expense of the faculty member or department.

Macintosh Computers:

Macintosh computers are considered custom systems (that is, a system that does not meet the criteria for a supported system) thus HCS provides service on a "best efforts" basis without any time or cost guarantee. Such support may be outsourced at the customer’s expense.

Computing Lab:

The software in the Computing Lab will be changed every semester. HCS will solicit faculty for lab software requirements at least 2 months prior to the semester. Faculty must respond to the call for requirements (Call for Software announcement) to be assured that their software needs are considered. HCS will investigate compatibility with the rest of the environment and, if feasible, include the requested software in the semester's build. The requesting faculty will arrange funding for purchase of licenses for the software they request. At the beginning of the semester, the Computing Lab configuration will be frozen -- HCS will accommodate only minor changes (such as add-ons, and plug ins) to the environment during semester.
Software determined to be incompatible with or that require human or infrastructure resources that are unavailable in the existing environment will require that a Proposal be drafted by the requestor. The Proposal will then be forwarded to the appropriate Computing Committee(s) for review and endorsement and then to the Dean's Office for final approval. The Computing Lab requirements of Ladder Faculty take precedence over other Faculty requests.
All installations and changes to the Computing Lab environment are scheduled for implementation according to a Project Management Plan.

Acquisition Process:

HCS will:

Recommend and process the purchase of new equipment, peripherals and components.
To the extent known, keep the customer informed of the vendor’s delivery schedule.
Install new equipment and supported software, if the hardware and operating system environments are compatible with our standard environment.

The cost(s) of acquiring equipment are the responsibility of the person or department making the request.

Storage of Data:

HCS provides data storage on both Windows NT and UNIX servers. Faculty are provided 80MB on NT and 25MB on UNIX home directories. Faculty requests for additional storage will be granted if sufficient storage is available.
Faculty who are over-quota will be notified by automated email response once per week. A 30-day grace period applies, after which the server will automatically lock out any operation that requires additional storage space.
Additional data storage can be purchased from IS&T on Socrates for $1000.00 per 1GB per year.

Backup of Data:

HCS performs a network server backup each night. Requests for restoration of data residing on HCS servers from data backups are processed by the HCS Help Desk. Data is kept for a period of no more than three months. Data older than three months cannot be recovered.
Faculty can establish ADSM backup service for their office computers from the university's central backup service, UC Backup. HCS will assist with establishing regular backups for their personal computer using this service. Backup service is offered to faculty as a recharge service through the UC Backup system at IS&T. HCS staff will install and support software to provide the automated nightly backup of Windows NT and UNIX systems.
An alternative data backup option is the use of an external hard drive device. In April 2004, the Faculty Technology Advisory Committee endorsed the use of external hard drives as a data backup alternative. The devices recommended by HCS are the models from Maxtor Corporation’s ‘One Touch’ product line. These drives come in storage sizes ranging from 80 GB to 300 GB and offer a simple one button push to operate. (These external drives also include scheduling software to automate backup processes.) HCS will provide assistance in the selection, installation and configuration of these storage devices.

Mailing Lists / Discussion Groups:

HCS creates and populates mailing lists for each lecture, seminar course and mandatory discussion section, excluding voluntary discussion sessions and independent study. The lists will be created and populated by the first day of Evening-Weekend MBA courses or two weeks prior to the beginning of instruction each semester. The lists are created using Course, Instructor, and GSI information provided by the Dean's Office. The lists are populated using student enrollment information from Catalyst.
Ownership of each lecture course list is assigned to the instructor. If no instructor is available, ownership is assigned to the GSI. Ownership of each discussion list is assigned to the GSI; if there is no GSI available ownership is assigned to the instructor. If no instructor or GSI is assigned, ownership will default to the Assistant Dean of Planning.
During the Add/Drop period, all course mailing lists remain closed for subscription and ownership transfer. Lists are repopulated nightly to reflect the enrollment changes. Once the add/drop period ends, all lists are open for subscription and transfer of ownership.
Course and discussion mailing lists are created with list approval disabled. This means that the list owner will not receive any notifications when someone subscribes to the list.
The default maximum message size (including attachments) is set to 2MB.
The names of each course and discussion section list are copied from the Haas course schedule (e.g. ugba101a-2, mba202-301b, ewmba206-1b).
To preclude conflict between spring and summer course mailing lists, all summer lists start with “su-“, followed by course name (e.g. su-ugba101a-2, su-mba202-301b, su-ewmba206-1b).
In the case of cross-listed courses, mailing lists will be created for the daytime MBA course only.
The administrative password for the list will be set to the same value as the naming structure, except that the dash is replaced with a period (.) (e.g., the password for ugba100-1 is ugba100.1; the password for su-ugba100-1 is su.ugba100.1).
Mailing lists for courses and discussion groups expire three weeks past the end of instruction per semester.

Web Authoring:

Web authoring assistance is provided by the Marketing Group. Questions concerning content development should go to the Marketing Group. Installation, configuration, and navigation assistance for HCS-supported web development tools is provided by HCS by request via the Help Desk.

Web Hosting Services:

Any Intranet content (e.g., for Internal use only, including course web sites) will be hosted on the NT domain, using Internet Information Server. The location of the Production web site is pre-determined by the documented Directory Hierarchy.
Any Corporate content (e.g., content pertaining to the marketing or external image of the school) will be hosted on the UNIX server, using Apache Server. The location of the Production web site is pre-determined by the documented Directory Hierarchy.

Network and Server Availability:

Routine maintenance is performed Sunday morning from 0600 - 1200. File servers, email systems, and other network services may not be available. Before routine maintenance, HCS will provide 48 hours notice in the Helpdesk Message of the Day.
Corrective maintenance will be performed as required with prior notification to the customer community as the urgency of the problem dictates.
HCS is permitted to bring servers down in the event of an emergency situation (e.g., building power failure) or critical security threat (e.g., root compromise). Approval for this action is made by the Associate Director of Systems and/or the Director of Computing and Information Systems.
Notification of server down will be made immediately to the Dean's Office.
Announcements of system security events will be made after the vulnerability has been mitigated.
It is important to remember that the business school is not a self-contained computing environment, and is linked to other networks within the University and to the Internet. In some cases, you may experience system delays or interruptions due to causes beyond the control of HCS. For example, when a main campus network connector (router) has problems. In such cases, HCS will work with University computing groups (IST, DCNS, et. al.) to help identify and correct problems in a timely manner. Local network resources permitting, we will continue to provide updates to the school on an hourly basis.
Server Uptime: minimum 99.0% system uptime per month (approximately 404 minutes reserved for planned maintenance activities).
All Production servers are monitored by an automated detection system on a 24/7 basis. In the event of an e-mail services disruption, the automated detection system alerts the System Administration group with a page. A System Administrator must respond to the page within 30 minutes.
If a disruption is caused by a software problem, the outage will be resolved as soon as possible. If caused by hardware failure, the outage will be resolved within the terms of the Vendor Service Agreement. For example, the SUN Service Agreement provides 5 day x 8 hour on-site assistance and 5 day x 12 hour software support for SUN products. An eight-business-hour turnaround time for parts replacement applies.

Research Computing:

Use of the Haas Research Computing Resources is guided by the Computer Use Policy for the University of California at Berkeley and the Faculty / Student / Staff Service Level Agreements (the "SLA's").

A user is expected to be courteous and sensitive to the activities of other Research Server users. Research Computing Etiquette and Best Practices for Bear Accounts should be observed at all times.
Anyone misusing an account will be warned and may have his/her access suspended immediately, and may be subject to further administrative or disciplinary action.

Each individual is responsible for ALL activity associated with his/her account.
Do not disclose your account information to anyone
DO NOT log into your account from another individual's account.
E-mail Helpdesk (or call 642-0434) immediately if you suspect that someone has gained access to your account.

Misuse of an account includes:

Unauthorized attempts to access accounts, files, or system resources.
Allowing another individual to access your HCS account.
Malicious mischief of any sort.
Any activity originating from an HCS account (on any computer system) that results in a substantiated complaint being logged against the user.
Using UC resources for commercial activity.
Use of electronic communications for advertising, selling, or sending chain letters.
Playing of games for other than academic purposes.
Failure to follow these SLA's or to cooperate with requests of Haas Computing Services regarding use of system resources.

Access to accounts:

Accounts for this system are available to Faculty, PhD students, Visiting Faculty, and Visiting Scholars upon request. Contact the HCS HelpDesk to establish a Research Computing Account.
Shell access to accounts will be granted only after the account holder has completed the Research Computing Orientation offered by the HCS Faculty / PhD Computing Group.
Shell access to the Research Server is allowed through the use of Secure Shell (e.g. SSH Secure Shell from SSH Communication Security Ltd.) only.
File transfer to and from the research server is allowed through the use of Secure Shell File Transfer Program.
Non secure Telnet and FTP services will NOT be run on the research server
No "r" commands can be used to access the Research Server (e.g., rlogin, rexec, rsh, rcp, and rdist).
No e-mail services will be run on the Research Server. For contact purposes, all Research Server account holders are provided with a Haas E-mail account.

Limitations on accounts:

Research Server accounts which are inactive (i.e. have not been accessed) for six months will be removed one week after a warning email is sent to the account holder.
Requests for an extension of an account must be received within 15 days of the account expiration date (enter a request for extension in HelpDesk).

Restrictions on files:

Only the owner will have "write" access to a "dot" file (a file located under the home directory with a name that begins with a "." prefix).
"Dot" files can not be a "link" to a file outside of the user's account.
No .rhosts files are permitted on the Research Server. All .rhosts files are removed by automated process.
No .netrc files are permitted the Research Server. All .netrc files are removed by automated process.
Users are restricted to creating and modifying files under their account (home directory). With the exception of the use of the directory "/tmp" the placement or modification of files in any other location is prohibited.

Sharing resources on the Research Server:

When system utilizations is high, users shall not run more than one large job (defined as consuming more then 10% CPU time per CPU) at a time. During periods of low utilization multiple large jobs may be run.
When system utilizations is high, users shall not run jobs on more than 3 CPUs simultaneously. During periods of low utilization the number of CPUs used simultaneously will not be restricted.
When printing, do not place more than 10 jobs in a printer queue.
When running a job expected to take longer than one hour, the user must lower the priority of the job by a minimum of 5 below standard execution (e.g., renice -n 5 sas dataset.sas).
Users are expected to clean up after their own jobs and manage the disk space they use. Disk swap space (e.g., /tmp) can be used for temporary (< 3 day) storage of files, and is cleared every 72 hours by automated process. If a user runs a program (e.g., SAS) which is using swap space, that space will not be cleared until the job is finished.
If a user job fills any shared disk space (e.g., /tmp), the user is expected to clear the space as soon as the problem is detected. If a disruption of service is caused by a user’s job running the temp/swap space full, a run-away process, etc., the system administration group may terminate the offending process after attempting to contact the process owner.
Also, please refer to the Best Practices for Bear Research Computing Accounts for additional guidelines.
The following disk storage quotas are in effect in each user's \home directory:

2000 MB soft limit, 2100MB hard limit for Faculty accounts.

1000 MB soft limit, 1100 MB hard limit for visiting Faculty and non-Faculty accounts.

(Once the soft limit has been passed, users are given 4 weeks until data can no longer be added to the account. Once the hard limit has been passed, the account will be effectively unusable. The `quota -v` command will let you determine your current storage allocation.)

In August 2003, additional storage space was provided to Bear research account holders in the form of a "bulk" folder located inside the user's home directory:

50 GB for visiting Faculty, non-Faculty and PhD accounts.

100 GB for Faculty accounts.

Users requiring additional disk storage need to submit a quota increase request to the Help Desk and/or the Assistant Director of Faculty & PhD Computing. If the request is granted, storage will be free to PhDs, and will cost a one time charge of $125 per Gigabyte for ladder faculty. (These funds will be used to finance the purchase of additional disk storage arrays.)

Data not accessed for one year are removed to conserve space. The backup copies of removed ('archived') data are deleted from the data library after an additional 90 days. Requests to restore archived data should be made through the HelpDesk. Account holders may purchase supported data backups for the purpose of maintaining their own archive of research data beyond 90 days.

Training, Documentation and the HCS web site:

One-on-one training for individuals is available by appointment upon request for supported software and hardware.
Training classes are provided through HCS for supported software and hardware. For a group of five or more participants, a training session can be set up for supported software for your individual group or department.
Formal training sessions will be set up for new supported software products as needed. Announcement of upcoming sessions will be posted around the school and sent out via email.
Vendor and third-party books and documents for most supported HCS applications are available in the Reference section of the Business Library.
How Do I?, installation and configuration procedures for select applications and "How Do I?" documents are available on the HCS web site. The content of the HCS web site is to include support for the current HCS-installed version of supported software and hardware. Documents describing legacy versions are provided on a best-effort basis.
Customers are also advised to take advantage of the web site support provided by most vendors of hardware and software. Most commonly encountered problems and their solutions are readily available at these web sites. These sites also have "chat groups" that raise and solve each other’s idiosyncratic problems.

UNIX Security:

Any faculty-owned UNIX machine may be immediately blocked at the router or physically disconnected from the network if Intruder monitoring detects a compromised computer. The owner of the compromised computer will be immediately notified of this action by phone and by e-mail as soon as HCS is aware of the compromise.
Any compromised computer will not be returned to service or reconnected to the network until the security compromise has been removed.
Any disruption of an HCS-owned server due to security compromise must be documented and the users of the affected server will be notified as soon as it is safe to provide the information (there are cases where disclosure can complicate the security problem).
Shell access to any HCS-owned server is allowed through the use of a Secure Shell port only. Inbound Telnet must be disabled.
Remote access is provided for servers only. No remote access services will be provided on any HCS-owned workstation.
No .rhosts files are permitted on any HCS server. Any and all .rhosts files are removed by automated process. No .netrc files are permitted on any system. Any and all .netrc files are removed by automated process. No "r" commands are permitted on the Haas E-mail/Web server. No X-based login (CDE or OpenLook) connectivity or applications are permitted on the Haas E-mail/Web Server.

NT Security:

Any faculty-owned NT workstation or server may be immediately blocked at the router or physically disconnected from the network if Intruder monitoring detects a compromised computer. The owner of the compromised computer will be immediately notified of this action by phone and by e-mail as soon as HCS is aware of the compromise.
Any compromised computer will not be returned to service or reconnected to the network until the security compromise has been removed.

E-mail and Mailing List Security:

E-mail passwords have the same security definition as UNIX account passwords. See the Accounts section for more information.
The default mailing list configuration is set for open access with no moderation. This means that anyone can subscribe themselves to a list and anyone can post content. Additional security (e.g., closed access, moderated lists, restricted posting, etc.) is implemented upon request. The initial list password is set at the time the list is created.
The list owner may also change configuration and security settings for a list through the use of the MajorCool web interface. It is the responsibility of the customer to understand how Majordomo configuration settings work and how they affect the operating characteristics of a mailing list.
It is the responsibility of HCS to provide initial set up and configuration of a list and to provide technical support for new and existing lists.

Projects and Proposals:

Projects definitions and proposals are co-developed by you and the Assistant Director of Faculty/PhD/Research Computing. Projects are defined by scheduling an interview with you, the project sponsor, principal investigator, the HCS Assistant Director, and others as deemed appropriate by you and the HCS Assistant Director. During the interview, the project is defined through negotiation and agreement by all parties, by accurately describing all major deliverables, and by creating a general timeline. Each major deliverable description includes functional requirements, scope and limitations, and a target delivery date. Any issues that arise from the discussion are captured, assigned an owner, and given a due date. The resulting document created at the interview is the project proposal. Project proposals are submitted to the Faculty/PhD/Research Computing Committee by you and the HCS Assistant Director. The committee reviews each project proposal and forwards favorably reviewed proposals to the Deans office for approval and funding.
The Dean's Office rates each recommended project proposal using specific criteria that determine the project's priority for funding and implementation. All recommended projects go into the HCS Project Portfolio. The projects that meet or exceed a minimum evaluation score are funded and/or implemented. Those that do not meet the minimum score fall below the cut line in the project portfolio and are reconsidered during the next evaluation cycle.
The HCS Project Portfolio is accessible on-line and is located within this web site.

last update April 16, 2007 - kv