Issue #80 April 2009

Contents

Service Interruption - MNHS Data Storage Cluster Project

Service Interruption - MNHS Data Storage Cluster Project - Thursday 16-Apr-2009
Hosts Effect: storage.med.monash.edu.au
When: Thursday 16-Apr-2009

Due to an unknown software problem the servers which provide user access to the data storage have become very unstable.
The result is that servers are crashing and causing users to lose connectivity to the file system.
This problem has been escalated to our software vendor. Their engineering staff are investigating the root cause of the problem and we are waiting for their advice on how to fix this issue.

Whilst investigations continue and to ensure that we protect data integrity all client access to the storage cluster has been stopped.

We apologise for any inconvenience caused.

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Service Interruption Update - MNHS Data Storage Cluster Project

Service Interruption Update - MNHS Data Storage Cluster Project
Hosts Effect: storage.med.monash.edu.au
When: Thursday 16-Apr-2009 - Friday 17-April-2009 AM

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Time to change your authcate password

ITS Security have peformed an audit of all Facultly authcate accounts and have found that over 1000 Faculty staff have not updated their authcate password in over 6 years. Over 100 staff have not changed theiri password in over 10 years.

Passwords at Monash
Your login details (username and password) should be treated like your bank PIN number and protected at all costs. You are responsible for this information and should never share your password with anyone. Sharing your password is a breach of the Acceptable IT use policy and can lead to disciplinary action.

Change your password often
As passwords can be captured and cracked over time, ITS recommends you change your passwords every 3 months. This makes it more difficult for any hackers to get access to your account.

Monash IT systems are set to check passwords when they are changed to ensure that they are difficult to guess, either by another human, or a program meant to guess passwords.  This helps ensure that your account cannot be broken into and your data (documents, programs, etc) stolen or deleted.

To change your password, visit:
http://www.its.monash.edu.au/staff/accounts/passwords/

Password security:
http://www.its.monash.edu.au/staff/security/passwords/pwsecurity.html

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Beware of fake Bank Emails

Last month, a Monash staff member was tricked into giving over their bank details in this recent attack:
http://www.sophos.com/blogs/gc/g/2009/04/02/data-leakage-double-time

Please note that Monash University, banks and financial institutions etc will NEVER ask for your account password via email or via telephone.

As these emails are an increasingly common problem, we need all staff to take notice of the safe
e-mail handling procedures and simply delete these fake, but official looking, e-mails.

These procedures can be found here:
http://www.its.monash.edu.au/staff/security/email-security.html

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SPAM Filtering Improved at Monash

Spam processing at Monash is about to change!  This change applies to everyone that receives email within the University, including all staff, students, centrally and Faculty hosted servers.

Background
As you would all be aware, over the past 18 months, the amount of spam that has made it through the central email infrastructure without being detected has steadily increased.  Starting next week, new spam processing software will be rolled out to help deal with this problem.

What's in it for me? / What do I have to do?
Overall, more spam will be detected and appropriately moved to your Spam/Junk folders.

You do not need to do anything.  There will be no change how the email is marked as spam, no changes required to spam processing rules, and the process for reporting spam will also remain the same.

Documentation regarding the spam service can be found at
http://www.its.monash.edu.au/staff/email/spam/

How much better is the new service?
A test was carried out on live traffic last month, where a copy of real traffic was sent to one of the new servers.  Out of all of the email traffic coming into Monash, the existing server detected 50% of email as being spam.  The new server detected 56% as being spam.

Why is so much spam getting through?
The current Monash spam processing uses a product called Spam Assassin to scan emails and detect spam.  The product works very well, but relies on Monash staff to keep the spam detection rules updated.  When it was implemented, this was a workable solution.  However, around 18 months ago, this all changed.  In the ongoing battle between spammers and spam detectors, spammers
keep modifying the contents of their emails to defeat spam detection rules, and various companies and institutions keep updating their rules to keep the spam out.

Around 18 months ago, spammers started to get very good at what they do.  The volume of spam traffic increased significantly, and the number of changes to the emails also increased.  The end result is that Monash, along with everyone else, were flooded with much more spam than ever before.  At this point, keeping up with rule changes with in-house resources quickly became no longer viable.

What is changing?
ITS will be replacing Spam Assassin with a product called Sophos Pure Message.  The main difference between the two is that the spam detection rules are managed externally by Sophos.  The rules are automatically updated several times a day.  This means that as new variations of spam are sent out, Sophos provide new detection rules and the Monash systems will be updated automatically.

Added to this, the existing spam and virus processing servers have reached their end of life.  The capacity of the server farm also needs to be increased to be able to handle the levels of email
traffic that we now receive.  New servers (using Pure Message rather than Spam Assassin) have been added to the server farm.

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Keeping data safe under VMware Fusion for Macintosh OSX

VMware Fusion (like 'Parallels') enables you to run Windows side-by-side with Mac OS X on any Intel-powered Mac, without rebooting.

However, we have found that if the virtual Windows image becomes corrupt, it is nearly impossible to recover the Windows data (unlike a normal Microsoft Windows computer).

To prevent data loss, we recommend all Fusion users store files created in their Windows Image under OSX using 'shared folders'. Instructions are available on the VMware website (http://www.vmware.com/products/fusion/resources/) or in the video: http://vmwareelearning.blip.tv/file/1259375/

For more information on VMWare Fusion, visit: http://www.vmware.com/products/fusion/

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SPSS-New product name is PASW

From the Desk of Jason Verlen
Vice President R&D and Chief Product Strategist of SPSS Inc.

It's an exciting time at SPSS Inc. We're working diligently in 2009 to make SPSS Inc. an even more valued partner for you and your organization.

We're proud that our products ensure you meet your research and business goals by driving the widespread use of data in decision making. We group our products in four "families" and they are designed to work together as part of one comprehensive analytics platform. To better reflect this unity, our products will be renamed under the Predictive Analytics Software (PASW) portfolio umbrella.

Over the next year, you will see new naming introduced with each release of our software products.

• Products in our Statistics family, like PASW Statistics (formerly SPSS Statistics), comprise the most widely used suite of statistical software in the world.
• Our Modeling family, including our leading data-mining workbench PASW Modeler (formerly Clementine) is consistently positioned as the leader in the analytics space.
• Our Data Collection family (formerly Dimensions), including PASW Data Collection Author and PASW Reports for Surveys, helps you obtain an accurate view of customer attitudes and opinions.
• The Deployment family bridges the gap between analysis and action and includes products like PASW Collaboration and Deployment Services (formerly Predictive Enterprise Services).

Rest assured that these name changes don't change the foundational technology on which you've come to count. We're continuing to build on our 40 year legacy with new products, enhanced performance, and robust deployment capabilities.

SPSS Inc. will be doing its part to help you make predictive analytics a vital part of your business operations.

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Can I install SPSS software?

1. Staff at Monash University may install and use SPSS.

Monash University staff members may use the Software on computers which are:

• a) owned or leased by Monash and
• b) controlled by Monash or
• c) in the case of full time or part time employees, on a home computer at their principal place of residence.

NOTE: Contractors, agents, invitees or honorary staff are not eligible.

2. Staff of Monash Entities may install and use SPSS provided that the Software is used only for the purposes of teaching, non-commercial research or study on computers owned, leased or controlled by Monash University.
List of eligible entities: http://www.its.monash.edu.au/staff/software/catalogue/spsslistofsites.pdf

3. For staff at home, please see last month's TSG news:
http://itm.med.monash.edu.au/itmnews/newsletter.cfm?issueNo=79#5

For more information, visit: http://www.its.monash.edu.au/staff/software/catalogue/spss-stat.html

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Register and download Graphpad Prism - new users

To register and download Graphpad Prism (Windows and Macintosh), please visit:
http://www.med.monash.edu.au/tsg/itss/software/guide/graphpad-prism.html

For more information on the Faculty's site licence, please visit:
http://www.med.monash.edu.au/tsg/itss/software/guide/graphpad-prism.html

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Microsoft Office 2007 for privately owned computers

Microsoft is offering the top of the range Ultimate 2007 version of Microsoft Office to all Australian university students and staff at a low price.

For more information, visit: http://its.monash.edu.au/news/microsoft-offer.html

To order, visit: http://www.microsoft.com/student/discounts/itsnotcheating/default.aspx

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NVivo 8 Workshop - Melbourne (May, 2009)

QSR International will soon be hosting training workshops for our latest product, NVivo 8, in Hobart and Melbourne.

If you would like a complete overview of the software you should enrol in both days but if you're short on time you can attend the first day only to gain an introduction to ‘NVivo 8 Fundamentals’.

Anyone who has previously attended the one day workshop is welcome to enrol in day two only. For more information on the workshop format and pricing, and to download an enrolment form, please click on the links below:

Melbourne Thursday 21 and Friday 22 May 2009

These workshops are ideal for those using research software for the first time, or for users of earlier versions of QSR software. Workshop costs include lunch and morning and afternoon refreshments.

Desktop computers are provided and you’ll receive your own comprehensive workbooks. Our workshops are always popular so we encourage you to enrol now to avoid missing out.

Just complete our enrolment form and email it to training@qsrinternational.com For any questions or to speak with us about training at your site, email training@qsrinternational.com

We hope you’ll be able to join us.

Sue Bullen

Training and Research Consultancy Regional Manager, Australasia

http://www.qsrinternational.com/training-and-events_calendar_detail.aspx?view=1178

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Undergraduate Student Labs Software - 2009

We are well into the teaching program for the first semester and I hope that the software for Semester One is working without any issues.  In order to plan for the remainder of the teaching year, I would ask that the academic and teaching staff start to consider their needs for Semester Two.  The software that has been installed for Semeser One can be found here: http://www.med.monash.edu.au/tsg/itss/studentlabs/lab-software.html

If your Department has a new program that is to be used in Second Semester or, if a particular program has been updated and you require the newer version, please use this web-link to of the changes required:
http://itm.med.monash.edu.au/undergradlabs/staff-info/request-change-2009.cfm

Please note the following important points:

1) This is the only official request form that will be accepted for changes to software in the Undergraduate Student Laboratories.  E-mails or phone calls requesting changes will not be actioned. 

2) We encourage and support the use of Blackboard to provide student data/work files.  But be aware that not all applications will function on "Blackboard".  If in doubt, please contact us by JobDesk for clarification.

3) No changes to the configuration of software will be made to any lab image during the official University teaching semester.

4) To help us ensure that all the correct changes are made as requested, please submit a separate request (using this form), for each change required.

5) Due to the complexity of the software images, we require sufficient time to install and thoroughly test both the hardware and software to ensure they work correctly in the undergraduate student laboratories, before they are made public.  Accordingly, we request that all changes to the software images for 2008 teaching year be submitted by 30th June 2009.

and finally,

6) Any requests for software changes, which are lodged on or after 1 July 2009, will be billed to the requesting Department.  And so, before any late requests are actioned, you must provide a valid cost centre, fund number and, have an approval from your resource manager or Head of Department.

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