Computer News No. 123 Sep.-Oct. 2006
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Computer News No. 123 Sep.-Oct. 2006 |
HKU Smartcard Integrated Access and Facilities Control System (SIFS)
- Access and Facilities Control for Centrally-Timetabled Classrooms from November 1, 2006 for lecture theatres of the Meng Wah Complex
- Who can check-in the classrooms?
- Briefing session materials
- Contacts
1. Access and Facilities Control for Centrally-Timetabled Classrooms from November 1, 2006 for lecture theatres of the Meng Wah Complex
The Registry, the Estates Office and the Computer Centre have collaborated and forming a project group to develop a smartcard-controlled system for regulating access to centrally-timetabled classrooms in the main campus. The main objective is to have better control on the use and security of the classrooms and to achieve better energy saving when the classrooms are not in use. With the help of an outside contractor, the ITE Smartcard Solutions Limited, the HKU Smartcard Integrated Access & Facilities Control System (SIFS) have been developed and phase one will be launched on November 1, 2006.
The first phase will include lecture theatres T1, T2, T3, T4, T5 and T7 of the Meng Wah Complex, and implemented from November 1, 2006 onwards. Depending on the outcome of the first phase, the system will be introduced to all other central classrooms phase by phase, with the objective of implementing the system in full within the shortest period of time.
The main features of the system are highlighted below for your easy reference. For full details on the SIFS system, please visit the website at http://www.hku.hk/sifs/index.html.
(a) Use of classrooms must be booked in advance, via the Examinations Unit. (b) All HKU staff card holders and HKU research student card holders can check-in classrooms with bookings. (c) All classrooms would be locked when there are no bookings for better security. (d) The doors of the booked classroom will be automatically unlocked by the system and air-conditioning and lighting to the room turned on 10 minutes before the starting time of the booking. This would allow students arriving early to enter the classroom to wait for the arrival of the teacher. (e) Although students can enter the room before the booked time, they will not be able to control the lighting and air-conditioning inside the room. They can only turn on the minimum lighting within the classroom. (f) When the designated user (the user) checks in, full lighting and air-conditioning will be turned on automatically. (g) To check in a room, the user must present a valid smart card at the smartcard reader installed outside the classroom. (For details of checking-in, please refer to the website material) (h) The user can also use a valid smartcard to open the AV box installed inside the classroom. (i) At the end of the booking, the user will hear five beeps to signify the expiry of the booking. The user should caution all staff and students inside the classroom to leave as all lighting (except the minimum lighting) and air-conditioning will be turned off 10 minutes after the end of the booking. The classroom doors will also be locked by the system, although users staying in the room can always open the door from inside. (j) During the booked period, the user can check out at any time by presenting a valid smartcard at the smartcard reader. When the user checks out, the system will also start beeping for 5 times, and 10 minutes from then, all lighting (except the minimum lighting) and air-conditioning will be turned off, and the door locked (similar to end-of-booking). (k) The user is always encouraged to properly check-out, especially on leaving early in order to save energy. 2. Who can check-in the classrooms?
The eligible users to the SIFS system are:
- All HKU staff card holders
- All HKU research student card holders
- All valid SIFS PIN holders
Please see section on FAQ/Tips Q1: What should I do if I do not have a smartcard? at http://www.hku.hk/sifs/index.html.
3. Briefing session materials
Briefing sessions to introduce the system to staff have been conducted on October 25 and 27, 2006. If you have missed them all, we have made available the presentation materials and the demo movie presented at the briefing sessions online. Please visit our website at http://www.hku.hk/sifs/index.html.
4. Contacts
If you require further details on the system, please feel free to contact us at the following numbers during office hours:
- Project co-ordinator: Computer Centre (2857 8595)
- Smart card, network: Computer Centre (2857 8589)
- AV box and equipment: Classroom Services Unit, Registry (2859 2452)
- Door locking, lighting, air-con: Maintenance and Operations Unit, Estates Office (2547 9522)
- Room Booking: Examinations Unit, Registry (2859 2445)
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Computer News No. 123 Sep.-Oct. 2006 |
Highlights After Upgrading to WebCT CE6
1. Introduction
As reported in issue 122 of Computer News, a new WebCT CE6 server for e-learning was launched in August, 2006. Over the past couple of months, most activities using the WebCT e-learning system were conducted through this new server.
400 courses in CE6 are being used by over 7,500 students in this first term. In September, over 120,000 logins from teachers and students were recorded on CE6. On the other hand, about 130 courses are still making use of the old CE4.1 server, serving 6,500 students. However, the number of logins to CE4.1 in September has dropped to 40,270 versus 115,151 same time last year. The data shows that over 75% of the activities on WebCT are now running on the CE6 platform.
Although the user interface of CE6 has been substantially redesigned by WebCT, it is encouraging to see that our teachers and students adopt to the new CE6 environment in a very short time.
A teacher can start to develop new course on CE6 by simply filling in a form. We organize regular training on creating WebCT courses and the next one will be on December 19, 2006. (To register, please visit HKU Portal => "Services" tab => "Workshops and Courses" link.)
Since the CE4.1 license will expire in August 2007, teachers who are still using CE4.1 should plan for the migration to CE6 as soon as possible. The following highlights how a teacher can migrate the course still running on CE4.1 to CE6.
2. My course is still running on CE4.1 this term, how can I move to CE6 later?
As a teacher, if your course has been successfully migrated from CE4.1 to CE6 in the August migration exercise and you have made update to the course content on CE4.1 instead of on CE6, you can redo the migration procedure and it should be successful provided that you haven't used tailor-made programs that are incompatible with CE6.
If your course was not successfully migrated in the August migration exercise (i.e. you cannot find your course in CE6), you would need to remove any special program or HTML codes that are incompatible with CE6 before retrying the migration procedure. Please contact the undersigned for details if necessary.
3. Some common questions on CE6 from teachers and students
While most users adopt to CE6 without much problem, we received a few commonly asked questions in the past 2 months, e.g.:
- problem in seeing the "MyComputer" icon for uploading files,
- problem in downloading Word or Excel files,
- will both CE6 and CE4.1 be updated when I update my course contents? (The answer is 'No' because CE6 and CE4.1 are running on different servers.)
To help users find solutions to their problems faster, we have prepared an FAQ page on WebCT for our users' reference.
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Computer News No. 123 Sep.-Oct. 2006 |
A First Look at Internet Explorer 7
1. Introduction
Microsoft has released the latest version of its web browser, Internet Explorer 7 (IE7), in October 2006. It will come with the new operating system Windows Vista to be released in late 2006. There may be a Windows Update of Windows XP which updates IE6 to IE7. In short, IE7 is coming.
IE7 includes enhancements to the look and feel of the user interface of the browser to provide end users a better browsing experience. IE7 also includes advancements in performance, security and application compatibility. There will be some changes in its security behaviour from IE6. The new features and the security behaviour are highlighted in the following sections. For details, please refer to the Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 site.
2. New features of Internet Explorer 7
IE7 includes the following new features which provide a better browsing experience.
- Streamlined User Interface
The screen layout of IE7 is reorganized to make it less cluttered and more streamlined by removing items that are not commonly used. The new user interface maximizes the screen space devoted to the web pages that users want to see and makes it easier to perform common browsing tasks.
- Tabbed Browsing
IE7’s tabbed browsing feature allows users to view multiple sites in a single browser window and easily switch from one site to another through tabs at the top of the browser frame.
- Improved Search Functionality
The search function is improved. Users can now enter their search key terms directly into a search box within the browser frame. Users can easily choose a search provider from the drop-down list or add more providers.
- Page Zoom
The Page Zoom feature allows users to enlarge or zoom in on individual web pages, to focus on specific content or to make content more accessible to those with vision impairments.
- Instant RSS feeds
IE7 provides integrated support for RSS feeds. It automatically checks RSS feeds on sites by lightening an icon on the toolbar. A single click on the icon
allows users to preview and subscribe to the RSS feed of a web site which IE7 is showing, and then be automatically notified as content is updated. Users can read RSS feeds directly in the browser. IE7 also allows users to update all their RSS feeds on demand.
Figure 2: RSS feed icon
3. Security and privacy protection features of Internet Explorer 7
IE7 includes major security enhancements to protect users from fraudulent websites and malicious software. The security enhancements include the following and it will make you feel different when browsing some sites:
- Phishing Filter
IE7 includes Phishing Filter to protect users against fraudulent web sites and blocks access to the sites if necessary. Users have the option to activate or deactivate the Phishing Filter in IE7. If Phishing Filter is activated, the filter is updated several times an hour via an online security service run by Microsoft and industry partners. If a web site is on the listed of reported phishing websites, IE7 will display a warning page and a notification on the Address Bar. However, this feature raises Internet privacy concerns by some users because IE7 sends users’ browsing activities to Microsoft servers for checking against lists of phishing websites.
Figure 3: A phishing web site is blocked by Internet Explorer 7
Phishing Filter.
- SSL (Secure Socket Layer) Encryption
SSL is used when a user visits a web site with URL starting with "https://...". Data transmission between a browser and the web site server will be encrypted. The encryption relies on a SSL web server digital certificate based on public key infrastructure (PKI) technology.
By default, IE7 will pre-trusted some certificate authorities (CA) which issue server certificates. IE7 will show the warning message as shown in Figure 4 to warn that IE7 is visiting a web site with non-pre-trusted server certificates. If a user trusts the web site (e.g. by knowing the URL is trustworthy, he can click the link "Continue to the website (not recommended)" on the web page to visit the web site.
Figure 4: Warning Page for site with invalid SSL certificate.
A user can check the information of a web site certificate (or called 'security certificate') by clicking the lock icon on the address bar of IE7 as shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Lock icon to show a web site certificate
- ActiveX Opt-In
By default, IE7 disables ActiveX controls to prevent potentially vulnerable controls from being exposed to attack by malicious web pages. Users can easily activate or deactivate ActiveX controls as needed through the Information Bar (appeared as the yellow bar under the IE7 tabs in Figure 6) and the IE7's Add-on Manager.
Figure 6: ActiveX controls are disabled by default.
4. Some changes of Internet Explorer 7 from Internet Explorer 6
IE7 behaves differently from IE6 in the following usage:
- Auto-Hide File Menu Bar
IE7 hides the "File" menu bar by default. Users can make the menu bar appear by typing ALT-F. Users can also turn off the "File Menu Bar Auto-Hide" feature by clicking on the right-hand side toolbar, as shown in Figure 7, Tools => Menu Bar. Although the auto-hide feature maximizes the screen real estate, users may find it difficult to navigate in Internet Explorer 7.
Figure 7: "File" menu bar is auto-hided by default.
- FTP (File Transfer Protocol)
The current version of IE7 does not support FTP. The FTP option in the file menu of IE6 to “Login As” a user to an FTP server is no longer available. Instead, users are required to visit FTP site in Windows Explorer by clicking Page => Open FTP Site in Windows Explorer, then click File => Login As in Windows Explorer. The previous version of IE, namely IE6, bypasses this step. In Internet Explorer 7, users have to go an extra step.
5. Automatic Delivery of Internet Explorer 7 to Windows XP
Note that Microsoft may distribute IE7 via Automatic Windows Update besides users manually downloading from the Microsoft Update web site. It is available for users of genuine Windows XP SP2, Windows XP 64-bit Edition, and Windows Server 2003 SP1. IE7 is coming, whether the users like it or not. For details on IE7, visit the Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 site.
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Computer News No. 123 Sep.-Oct. 2006 |
From the Help Desk... Beware of Spyware and Phishing Email
1. Internet Crime Using Spyware
Spyware is a software that covertly gathers user information through an Internet connection without the user's knowledge, and feeds the information to the spyware author or to someone else. Spyware has the ability to monitor keystrokes (for passwords, bank account numbers, credit card numbers, etc.), scan files on the hard drive, snoop other applications, install other malicious programs, change the default home page on the Web browser, etc. ... The captured information may be sold to other parties for advertising or marketing purposes or used in computer crimes.
A common way to become a victim of spyware is to download certain peer-to-peer file swapping programs available on the Internet.
Another common way to contract a spyware is when users receive a phishing email telling them to visit a certain website and click a certain hyperlink. Lately, thousands of people have reportedly fallen prey to a phishing attack that uses ecards as bait. The cards appear to come from a secret admirer. When the recipient clicks on the provided hyperlink, the computer is directed to a malicious site that attempts to download a keystroke logger, the card is then displayed.
A more deceptive phishing email is to fake the sender email address with some administrative accounts of your email server, such as abuse@hku.hk or admin@hku.hk. The following is a sample malicious email which spreads recently. Note that though the web address shown in the malicious email looks like real and from a central server, it actually is not (there is no server called 'www.cc.hku.hk') and clicking on the hyperlink will download a malicious program, e.g. a computer virus or a spyware.
--------- begin of a malicious mail ---------------- From: abuse@hku.hk [mailto:abuse@hku.hk] Sent: Wednesday, October 25, 2006 xx:xx PM To: username@hku.hk Subject: Account Alert Dear Valued Member, According to our terms of services, you will have to confirm your e-mail by the following link, or your account will be suspended for security reasons. http://www.cc.hku.hk/confirm.php?account=username@hku.hk <actually clicking this link will lead to downloading a malicious program from http://www.xxx.yyy/Confirmation_Sheet.pif> After following the instructions in the sheet, your account will not be interrupted and will continue as normal. Thanks for your attention to this request. We apologize for any inconvenience. Sincerely, Cc Abuse Department --------- end of a malicious mail ----------------2. Your computer can be exploited as a phishing site or a member of a botnet
Once the spyware is installed on your computer, it not only captures your information, your computer may also be exploited to become a phishing website without your knowledge.Because spyware is using memory and system resources of the infected computer, when many computers are infected by spyware and launching attacks to other computers on the network, the network response can be slow and the computers being attacked may not respond at all. Such group of infected computers is often called a botnet.
3. Preventive measures against spyware
We reiterate our usual advice for our users to increase the security of their computer systems as follows.
1. Perform Windows Update or other brand of operating system on your computer whenever a critical update is released. Applying patches to your operating system and/or system software is the first line of defense for closing up the loopholes through which spyware can come in your computer.
2. Install anti-virus and anti-spyware programs on your PC.
Often the anti-virus software cannot detect a spyware. For Windows users, you can install the Microsoft Defender or the Spybot on your PC. See instructions under Q7B at http://www.itservices.hku.hk/faq/virus.htm
3. Install a firewall in you computer (the Windows XP SP2 has a firewall as a default). The firewall prevents unauthorized access to or from your computer through some network connection port numbers.4. Do not open any suspicious attachments before scanning them for virus.
5. Do not visit any suspicious web site especially those telling you to update or change your personal or financial information.
6. Do not install peer-to-peer file sharing software.
The new version of the browser Internet Explorer 7 (IE7) has a Phishing Filter which helps users detect phishing web sites. Please see the related article in this issue of the Computer News.
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Computer News No. 123 Sep.-Oct. 2006 |
Optical HARNET Provides 10G Connectivity Between HK Universities
1. Background
In issue no. 122 of Computer News, we reported on the Computer Centre working with the JUCC (Joint Universities Computer Centre) to implement the new optical network backbone of HARNET (The Hong Kong Academic and Research NETwork) to cope with increasing demands for Internet bandwidth to facilitate the research and academic activities of the 8 tertiary education institutions. The optical backbone provides two 10Gbps rings covering all the 8 institutions on HARNET. It employs Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) optical technology to optimize the data carrying capacity of a single optical fiber. It can also facilitate academic research activities because different network services (e.g. data traffic, high-definition video stream, SAN storage connection, etc) can be carried on different wavelengths (lambda) over a single fiber connection.We are pleased to report on the progress of the project.
2. Recent Progress
After the tendering exercise by JUCC, the vendor PCCW was selected to provide the required fiber connections and optical networking equipment for HARNET institutions. Since July 2006, the Computer Centre has been working closely with the JUCC on the upgrade and on extensive network backbone reconfiguration works. The optical equipment was installed by the vendor and testing work had been completed in September, 2006. Afterwards, Internet2 traffic of HARNET institutions was migrated to travel through the new optical HARNET backbone since early October, 2006. The JUCC Network Task Force (NTF) is closely monitoring on the new optical network with the vendor, and further tuning of network parameters would be carried out when required.Besides normal data traffic, JUCC NTF is also arranging testing with the vendor on remote SAN storage backup and on high-quality video transmission . We will report on further progress in the future Computer News.
3. Highlights of the optical HARNET network infrastructure
The 8 institutions on the optical HARNET are connected to form a "ring in ring" network design. (See Figure 1.) There is a large "outer ring" connecting all 8 institutions and a smaller "inner ring" connecting HKU, CUHK, HKUST,and PolyU. Each 10Gbps ring has fail-over protection, resulting in 5Gbps usable bandwidth per ring. Self healing switching time is less than 50ms, and thus providing fast self-healing resilience for the optical HARNET. In the new optical HARNET set-up, Nortel OME6500 optical switch equipped with optical multiplexers are installed at all 8 HARNET institutions. The new optical backbone provides Gigabit Ethernet (GE) connections and Fiber Channel (FC) connections. The FC connections enable collaboration between HARNET institutions for remote backup based on SAN connections. The new optical HARNET backbone provides the flexibility to reconfigure the GE and FC connections between the institutions as the need arises.
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4. Two central exchange points at HKU and CUHK connecting to the Internet
Two central exchange points are established at HKU and CUHK to which the GE wide area network connections from the other six institutions are connected. The two central exchange points provide redundant connections to the network of the vendor PCCW for connecting to the Internet.
The existing HARNET is still running till next summer when it will be wholly superseded by the new optical HARNET. The new optical HARNET network configuration is more complicated than before. As the Computer Centre takes up the role of running a central exchange point, the workload on network support and network management is increased. We shall strive to keep the state-of-the-art optical HARNET serve the University and HARNET better.
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Computer News No. 123 Sep.-Oct. 2006 |
Campus Network Backbone Upgraded with 10G Technology
The Computer Centre is pleased to announce that the campus network backbone has been upgraded to deploy 10Gbps technology. The old campus network backbone was based on Cisco Catalyst 6509 backbone gigabit switches which has been running for over 6 years. There has always been expansion of the campus network each year and more network equipments are connecting to the backbone switches.Although the current backbone equipment has gone through different upgrades over the years to cope with the increased network requirement, they are now running close to its end of life and future upgrades will likely incur a higher upgrade and maintenance costs. Starting from last year, the Computer Centre is gradually building up a new campus backbone based on Huawei-3Com's high performance 10G Ethernet backbone equipment, the Quidway S8512 10Gigabit Ethernet switches.
The new campus backbone consists of three such 10G Ethernet switches interconnected together to form a resilient ring topology. (See Figure 1) This new network backbone has two gigabit links to the old Cisco campus network backbone to maintain the network connectivity and compatibility with the existing network services.
Figure 1: Ring Topology of the new 10G Ethernet campus network backbone switches
A new campus network topology is being built up on the new backbone. Some of the network services are also being migrated to this new backbone. This new backbone provides higher network bandwidth to cope with increased bandwidth requirements from users and applications. The new backbone will also facilitate the use of more demanding network applications, such as high definition video broadcast, since the 10G Ethernet switches support newer hardware features for implementing the advanced network functions such as IP multicast and IPv6.
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Computer News No. 123 Sep.-Oct. 2006 |
Links to Remote Premises Upgraded to Use Metro-Ethernet Services
In the past years, ATM framelink technology, which was cost effective, had been in use for network connections between HKU main campus and several remote sites. However, the maximum connection speed of an individual site is limited to 1.5Mbps, which is not sufficient for some sites as the bandwidth utilization keeps increasing during the years. Besides, the technology is not as cost effective now as newer WAN technologies emerge. From September 2006, Metro-Ethernet Service provided by PCCW is employed to replace the old ATM framelink connections for the following remote sites:
- Hing Wai Centre (Estates Office and Library Unit) - 4Mbps connection
- Admiralty Centre (School of Business) - 4Mbps connection
- Family Medicine Unit (Department of Medicine - Apleichau Clinic in Aberdeen, Hong Kong) - 1Mbps connection
- Tsan Yuk Hospital (Department of Social Work and Social Administration) - 1Mbps connection
Metro-Ethernet Service is based on mature Ethernet technology, such that it is more cost effective than the old ATM-framelink technology in terms of networking equipment cost and monthly rental cost. Moreover, the connection speed of an individual site can be greater than the old limitation of 1.5Mbps. The new network set up for remote premises is more suitable to satisfy the requirements and to cater for future growth.
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Computer News No. 123 Sep.-Oct. 2006 |
Upgrade of Systems for Supporting Students
1. Introduction
To cope with increasing demand of users accessing the web-based student related applications for HKU members and applicants seeking admission to the University, the computing servers for the Student Connect and Extranet servers are to be upgraded with new computer servers over the last weekend in October 2006.2. Upgrade of Student Connect & Extranet servers
The new servers will support the following systems:
- Student Connect system supports services related to the studies of the students, including master registration to study at the University, student course selection, hall application, application for transcript/testimonial.
- Research postgraduate and taught postgraduate on-line application system.
- Those services running in the original Extranet system which is the computer system supporting online application accessed from Extranet (as opposed to Intranet). The services include the JUPAS (Joint University Programmes Admissions System) online admission, Netmatch system of the Careers Education and Placement Centre for matching jobs between potential employers and employees, online applications for alumni (e.g. Online Alumni Directory), E-voting system of the Convocation, EC-survey system of the Computer Centre for on-line surveys, Publication Search System for searching for research projects and publications, etc.
The newly installed servers are integrated into a new high-availability system. The new system consists of a pair of IBM p550 servers, each with 4 CPUs, 16GB memory, attached to the HP XP10000 SAN storage sub-system. The processing power of new system is about 2 times faster than the existing Student Connect system and 6 times faster than the existing Extranet system.
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Computer News No. 123 Sep.-Oct. 2006 |
Staff News
We are pleased to welcome another a staff member, Miss Liu Qing joining the Computer Centre in September 2006. Miss Liu received her Bachelor of Engineering Degree at Guangdong University of Business Studies, Guang Zhou, China in 2005 and her Master of Science in Computer Science Degree at City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong in 2006. She is now supporting the Centre's Administrative Services Team and working for the project on conversion of legacy Oracle applications.
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Computer News No. 123 Sep-Oct. 2006 |
Training NewsThe following are the training courses arranged by the Computer Center till December 2006 to help our staff and students learn how to use the various software and services. Most courses are open to HKU staff and students free of charge. Some courses are provided by a course vendor and a fee is charged for these courses (e.g. the Microsoft Office series and other PC software). Click on the course title to see the description of each course.
Course Schedule
Courses on Web-based Learning Systems
Courses on Web Page Browsing and Authoring
Courses on Statistics Software
Courses on Scientific Computation & Visualization
Courses provided by course vendors on PC software
Course Descriptions
Courses on Web Page Browsing and Authoring
Courses on Web-based Learning Systems
Courses on Scientific Computation & Visualization
Courses provided by course vendors on PC software course (fee required)
The Computer Centre runs courses in the following areas throughout the year to assist staff and students in using the Centre's facilities:
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Computer News No.
123 Sep-Oct. 2006 |
Hotlines
Channels and Telephone Numbers for Seeking HelpDial-up Services
56Kbps HKUPPP Dial-up modem lines and numbersOperations Schedule
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