by Ratanjot Rekhi
The Information Techonology (IT) Department has announced changes that will be occurring over the next month concerning the waiting time for computers and the issue that is in turn, created with printing.
Dr. Edward Chapel, assistant vice president of information technology, acknowledged the “flow challenge” and long lines that accumulate during peak hours of 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. during the school week and has in turn, already started to make changes to address the issues.
Towards the end of last semester, an additional printer was added to the Surf-n-Print Depot that only prints double-sided pages.
“All printers are not equal as far as pages per minute ratios are concerned,” Chapel said.
If a printer can print more pages in a minute by strictly printing double-sided, the wait time to get onto a computer will be decreased. Getting to a computer and printing items out goes hand-in-hand.
“Though it is inevitable that the problem will exist during finals and midterms, when students are printing out large documents that covered a portion of the semester,” Chapel said, “The ideal situation is that there will be no wait.”
While the ideal situation may not necessarily be able to be reached all the time, the IT department will be adding at least 10 more computers to the Surf-n-Print Depot, a popular area on campus that students stop by to quickly print items out before classes.
Since University Hall is also a common place where many go to to print daily, the IT Department will be transforming the overflow laptop lab on the fifth floor to a Surf-n-Print facility with a 10-minute time limit during peak hours or whenever a line forms.
If there is not a line, students will be able to use the laptops with no time limit.
“The lab assistants will have to be trained for crowd-control for once those lines start forming,” Chapel said.
In addition, eight computers will be added to the overflow laptop lab on the fifth floor of University hall that are “only for printing always,” Chapel said. These eight computers will always run on a 10 minute time limit and will be set up so students have to stand at the computer, print their items and leave.
Sprague Library printing will be slightly altered, as well. The IT department has been working diligently to solve the problem of laptop wait by purchasing charging trees and additional batteries.
Chapel did not expect students to utilize printing options in Sprague Library to the level that they clearly have been.
“That’s a happy problem. We created this facility because we thought the library needs to be invigorated,” he said.
At least three Surf-n-Print computers will be added to the Student Interactive Multimedia Lab on the second floor of the library that will be under a 10 minute time limit for students that just want to print something very quickly while they may be studying or reading in the library.
Furthermore, three more high capacity printers will be added to the campus, one each in the Information Commons Lab, Overflow Laptop Lab in University Hall, and the Laptop Lending Lab in Sprague Library.
In order to better understand the issue of printing, a brief survey will be added as soon as students sign on to computers or laptops.
The questions will include:
1. Did you have to wait for a computer?
2. If you had to wait, for how long? 3. For what purpose are you using the computer (i.e. printing only, personal use, classwork, etc.)
