I’d like to offer a few comments on the November 5 Review editorial
about unreliable printing in Renshaw. By far the most common problem
is a job sent to a printer that that can’t be printed, usually
because it is too complex. When this happens, the printer is out of
order until someone calls ITS so we can clear the offending print job.

ITS rewrote the signs in the labs with the goal of making it clearer
and more obvious that we need a phone call to fix problems. Often
though, we don’t get calls. If anyone has a suggestion about how to
make our signs clearer or more noticeable, please let me know.

It is true that ITS doesn’t have staffing sufficient to keep our
help desk open past 5 p.m. so there’s no one to call. The editorial in
the Review prompted me to take two actions to address after hours
coverage. First, we put in place logging so that we can monitor the
extent of this problem. This logging may show that we need to shift
our staffing toward the evening. Second, we are looking into ways to
clear printer problems after hours with out changing our staffing away
from what we currently feel is the busiest time of the day.

A couple of facts:
During the month of October 2010, 750 students successfully printed a
total of over 23,000 pages in the Renshaw labs.

In that same time period the ITS support desk received one (1) call
about printer problems in Renshaw Hall.

-Irv Wiswall ITS