My college IT department are idiots.

[Louster]

Okay, so that's not unusual, but these guys seem especially stubborn in their blind stupidity.

The thing is, for the last 2 months the internet connection for the halls of residence has been nigh on unusable. The problem, according to our wonderous IT department, is "people using instant messengers are using up all the bandwidth". They switch between calling them "chat rooms" and "MSN" so I don't know exactly what they mean, but in any case they seem to be banning people caught using these oh-so naughty programs. (Personally, I wouldn't touch MSN with a barge pole, but it's the principle of the thing.)

Anyhow, here's why I think they're idiots.

First, bandwidth is not, actually, an issue. The problem with our connection is creating new connections, not maintaining them. In other words, connecting to a website can take up to 20 minutes (for fuck's sake!) but, once connected, the thing downloads instantly (the exceptions are websites which have other websites embedded within them, such as adverts or whatever.) This is more demonstrable with large files: once connected, we get a consistent, relatively acceptable 80-100kb/s. However, as I've mentioned, initially creating the connection takes goddamn ages.

Second, MSN, and other IMs, really don't use that much bandwidth. The one time I challenged them on this, they became irritable and defensive (of course) and claimed that, though the actual bandwidth usage of the text in chats was negligible, "MSN maintains a constant chatter with the server, advertising whether you're online or away and such". A couple of weeks ago I tested this theory at home. I logged into our server, ran trafshow and monitored the bandwidth usage of an MSN connection. It averaged at some 20 bytes a second, and peaked, once, at 200. Whether or not it does maintain a constant chatter, it uses fuck all bandwidth. Even if you consider everyone in our halls to be heavily using MSN all at once, all the time, it would use up something like 15kb/s.

Third, they appear to be using a prefabricated router/firewall thing (a "Firebox", judging by the way we have to authenticate - google for it, I'm not spending 20 minutes finding a link) and so, quite possibly, don't know what the fuck they're doing. Also, right at the start of moving in, while having a conversation with some IT department person, I asked why they couldn't simply limit the bandwidth usage of users, and the response was "We don't have the software." When I pointed out that you can do this stuff with free, open source software: "We're not interested in what other people's setups can do, only ours."

SO ANYHOW.

Given that maintaining connections is fine, but creating new ones is not, does anyone know of anything I could set up on my home network to allow me to maintain a constant, generic connection from here to there, through which I could do whatever else?

 

[`mongoose]

Heh

Well as a college 'it' guy I'll answer some of your queries for you.

MSN/AOL/ICQ etc etc. These are tricky and tbh a pain in the arse to stop, but not impossible. I am interested to view your agreement with the college halls fo residence as most uni's don't really care what people do on their 'halls' connections as long as they don't try and hack or generally exploit their large connection. Getting back to the point tho, if you just use msn for chatting etc then no it doesn't take much bandwidth at all. If however you start sending files off over msn it can escalate quite rapidly. The problem is, is that to send the file these apps will quite literally use all bandwidth available to send the file, now if this is to another person with a large connection they could be spiking your internet connection out (or hammering the local hubs if you aren't on a switched network which you should be imo)

Firebox/authenticated browsing. Enforcing a log on to surf the net is one way of ensuring that people who do naughty stuff get logged and caught. As you seem to be able to download at a constant rate once connected to the site I would imagine that the box doing the authentication is being hammered and simply cannot keep up with requests. Either that or your DNS is shite and taking ages to find sites.

Either way it's not always easy to maintain a network to mutliple users to meet their needs with a limited budget. I'm lucky, where I work actually realise the need for a solid infrastructure, there are other colleges where frankly, their network budget is pennies. In these places getting any sort of metric testing or switch monitoring is almost impossible as they have to use the cheapest possible kit.

My advice is to raise the issue of long connection times with tech support, if they ignore you or don't respond in what you feel is a valid way, I would raise the issue with the quality team at the college. Every college of FE and most Universities will have a quality assurance team who will raise matters on your behalf and organise student forums etc where you can legitimately raise your complaints.

In my experience the quality forums are a good way for students to get their issues resolved and for college IT fellas to see where the holes in their provision are.

M

 

[Louster]

if you just use msn for chatting etc then no it doesn't take much bandwidth at all. If however you start sending files off over msn it can escalate quite rapidly.

Indeed - however, they have specifically blamed chat programs themselves, rather than file transfers. They've even gone so far as to block all the chat programs' websites. They're completely insane. Also, as I say, it really doesn't seem to be a bandwidth issue in the first place.

Firebox/authenticated browsing. Enforcing a log on to surf the net is one way of ensuring that people who do naughty stuff get logged and caught. As you seem to be able to download at a constant rate once connected to the site I would imagine that the box doing the authentication is being hammered and simply cannot keep up with requests. Either that or your DNS is shite and taking ages to find sites.

My DNS is fine. I switched from using the one they specified (oh yeah, I forgot to say - they require you to bring your computer down to the IT department, and leave it there for "four hours", which, for me, turned out to be 3 days, while they "set it up" for you. This is not optional, it's enforced. Talk about a waste of everyone's goddamn time.) to the same one I use at home, and it's fine. I can resolve addresses without problems.

if they ignore you or don't respond in what you feel is a valid way,

Yes. Whenever I've brought this up, and I've done so maybe 3 times now, they insist it's "chat rooms". They even told me that my claim, that chat programs don't inherently use much bandwidth at all, "demonstrated my ignorance of how chat programs work" (paraphrasing). Fuckers.

I would raise the issue with the quality team at the college. Every college of FE and most Universities will have a quality assurance team who will raise matters on your behalf and organise student forums etc where you can legitimately raise your complaints.

Hmmm. I don't know of anything quite like that here but I guess I probably haven't looked properly.

 

[`mongoose]

Yes. Whenever I've brought this up, and I've done so maybe 3 times now, they insist it's "chat rooms". They even told me that my claim, that chat programs don't inherently use much bandwidth at all, "demonstrated my ignorance of how chat programs work" (paraphrasing). Fuckers.Hmmm. I don't know of anything quite like that here but I guess I probably haven't looked properly.

LOL

'kin quality

Reading between the lines I am imagining that they want to block certain chat programs to stop warez downloading. This would also explain the old 'we'll set your pc up for you policy' as it would allow them to sneakily peruse the pc to make sure you haven't got anything naughty on it.

I would definately look into raising it as an issue with lecturer/head of dept/ head of school etc. I monitor bandwidth at our place as part of my job and I can tell you for one that whilst web surfing and chat proggies do take up a considerable amount of bandwidth, this falls into insignificance behind p2p stuff. we can tell within 5 minutes if someone is using p2p at our sites as you can see a 1 or 2mbps jump in throughput the minute they start to leech.

To try and streamline connections I would check the IE options - look for at the internet connection settings etc etc. If you have already done that then you're a little bit stuffed as I would imagine the latency is being added around the gateway and has very little to do with your pc

M

 

[old.user4556]

*something*

The reason they're not that willing to do it is because you're probably (based on what you've said) irritating their tits off with your apparent "better than them" attitude.

I've seen it happen at uni and i've seen it happen in work, over and over again - there's always one person who proclaims that the engineers/IT guy/bofh know nothing and that they 'could do a better job'; wanting to dictate how their network/system should be run. I can usually trouble shoot things myself, but i absolutely do not belittle them about their knowledge, or lack of.

The truth is that they probably don't care, or they don't get paid enough to really care about it, or you're the only one complaining; which brings me to the point of my post: system support, engineers, business support, IT guys, cisco certified self-important technician - whatver you want to call them - usually require a certain amount of complaints and/or escalation to bother doing anything about it. Where I am, if you're the only one having a problem and other people seem to be fine then they're reluctant to bother and just throw the usual "reboot your machine" (or in your case 'it's chat rooms') excuse.

My suggestion to you is prepare your case, get your uni friends together and try many different PCs across the site so you've got a catalogue of events/problems from many students. Get some backing from a director of studies and take it from there.

Taking the stance of "they know nothing, I know all" is only going to a) make you look like an idiot here and b) make your uni IT guys make you feel as welcome as a fart in a space suit.

G

 

[`mongoose]

I've seen it happen at uni and i've seen it happen in work, over and over again - there's always one person who proclaims that the engineers/IT guy/bofh know nothing and that they 'could do a better job'; wanting to dictate how their network/system should be run. I can usually trouble shoot things myself, but i absolutely do not belittle them about their knowledge, or lack of.

Heh we regularly get a person in who has win 98 and broadband at home complaining about our network. He said we should've stuck on win 98 rather than move to xp. He's always a giggle.

Having said that, it always irritates me when techies get lazy and respond with the old 'reboot your machine' or bs excuse. It only means the next fella who has to fix the problem gets a pissed off member of staff or student to deal with.

M

 

[Tom]

What the....

I thought that was Jas!

https://forums.freddyshouse.com/member.php?u=226

 

[`mongoose]

someone stole my sully avatar!



/em hunts for a new avatar

M

 

[Louster]

The reason they're not that willing to do it is because you're probably (based on what you've said) irritating their tits off with your apparent "better than them" attitude.

In all honesty, I've only come to the conclusion that they're idiots after they've fucked us around for a good 2 months. They're perfectly aware of the problem - they've had complaints from plenty of people, and everyone with a computer in the halls of residence has the exact same problem - but they've been endlessly insisting it's this one possibility, and essentially blaming the users for this shit.
And no, apart from the one time where I got into an argument about IMs using barely (relatively) any bandwidth (and this is patently and demonstrably obvious) I've never actually challenged them on this shit, as I'm perfectly aware of what you're saying. In the same conversation (before they got pissed off - and by the way, this "conflict" happened reasonably recently - as in, a long, long time after this problem manifested) I pointed out the inconsistencies with their explanation (ie. the fact that bandwidth is not an issue) and they simply refused to listen. If ANYONE has a "better than them" attitude, it's the assholes in our IT department.

To summarise: I haven't actually come close to expressing my frustration to these jerks, as I know that it'll only make matters worse.


Edit: Just to clarify, it isn't a University - it's an FE college, so perhaps that's why this is happening in the first place.

 

[Honza]

At my colledge the situation is much much worse... For 1273 computers we have connection to the internet and the other colledges only 11 Mbps half duplex. And like if was not enough, all the services except HTTP are forbidden and blocked. So we have to hack through even for stupid e-mail downloading :-(

 

[kingcon]

Yeah i have the exact same problem at my college the poopie heads! And theyv installd some "websence" prog to stop everything includeing email access and i cant get round it atall, poor show...

 

[`mongoose]

Bear in mind lads that most colleges have tiny net connections in comparison to universities. The Learning Skills Council provides a single 2mb connection for a college for free. If you have more than one site you have to pay for that connection yourself which isn't cheap. Many colleges simply won't have the budget to afford that and will use cheaper connections (broadband etc) to provide some sort of service. The LSC have agreed to upgrade all FE colleges to 10mb but this is going to be dependent upon locality and BT infrastructure. It's also a 90 day turn around on most les-10/les-100 circuits.

I have visited 4 universities in the midlands and the smallest net connection they had to JaNET and therefore the internet was something like 200mb. University of Warwick have their own fibre directly into the SuperJaNET backbone. They simply don't care what students do in halls cos they don't need to.

As a result anything that college can shave off the overhead of the internet connection they will do. Blocking forums or sites that are of limited educational use, blocking email etc etc. In all fairness if you have access to this you're lucky. Colleges are no different to other companies in industry trying to control bandwidth usage and time wasting.

Where I do agree is that I don't feel that your IT department have handled your concerns well.

M

 

[Honza]

Seems colleges in Czech have better connection than these in UK...
Now even we have 11 Mbps we'll get 1 Gbps optical connection till end of the year.

Hmm, this is quite offtopic, but interests me alot...
How are your colleges administrated?
My UNI, (www.zcu.cz) has several colleges that are being slowly connected with optical connection instead of microwave one. The area of network being administered by CIV (local UNI part working as ISP and PC maintence) ends with gigabit CISCO switch (we call it Skywalker). The rest of network is being maintained by students (4 buildings quite close to themselves connected between themselves with 1Gbps line). On this network we have 1273 computers (855 of these are never turned off ). There is HTTP server with official college website, FTP server (with studying materials ofc ;-) ), TV broadcasting server (ye, web TV works here with all 4 basic CZ TV channels), IRC server, DNS server, DHCP server and special 'all tryings here' server. All the servers work on Debian Linux. And I have to say the network works really well. Just to complete picture every student joining the network gains his own IP address and DNS entry. If computer spreading virus packets or something otherwise disturbing is detected, it's cut off from the network and rejoined in case it has been cleared. Every student (except student admins - there is 14 of us) pays 50 CZK (~1,5 Eur) per year for the network updates fund.

 

[`mongoose]

That sounds really cool honza. Well impressed with the students contributing to the network updates fund.

In the UK there is a central fibre backbone which is more or less managed by JaNET http://www.ja.net./ There's tons of stuff about it.

JANET essentially are serious network fellas who provide bandwidth to UKERNA who act as an ISP for most academic institutions and some of the local authoritites.

The learning skills council pays for most college connections to the tune of 2mb atm. In future this will be 10mb but thats still tiny compared to most universities who have between 100mb to 1gb feeds. Universitys fund their own connections as far as I am aware.

Tons of info about the network on the jaNET website.

Bear in mind there is a hell of a difference between a college of FE and a university. Colleges of Further Education do Gcses/ NVQ's/ A levels/ Btecs/ HND's and the odd HNC in conjunction with universities. The uni's are a totally different kettle of fish.

M

 

[wyrd_fish]

at aberystwyth we have a 10mbit connection to janet funded by some educational authority, and i think they said that other uni's are the same

 

[Honza]

That sounds really cool honza. Well impressed with the students contributing to the network updates fund.

Well when you happen to come in Pilsen, letme know, I'll show you the den (=server room) ;-)

Otherwise your educational system is big ? for me... In CZ there are universities and students who live too far from it get college (it's their temporary home during their studies). Obviously UK colleges work different - as postgradual education institute ?

 

[old.user4556]

Ahhh superjanet, i remember QW well on a 10 ping in the days where home broadband was a just a sperm.

G

 

[`mongoose]

Well when you happen to come in Pilsen, letme know, I'll show you the den (=server room) ;-)

Otherwise your educational system is big ? for me... In CZ there are universities and students who live too far from it get college (it's their temporary home during their studies). Obviously UK colleges work different - as postgradual education institute ?

Hey Honza - don't tempt me - I fancy a trip to the czech rep

Fe colleges are a link between school and university for many although the way education works here in the UK we tend to pick up kids for ages of 14 and then do courses for anyone from there. Admittedly we only tend to get a very small number of 14-16 year olds (kids who just don't fit in at school).

The network is pretty huge here but then it's a national thing that covers the whole country. We're lucky that they have done it tbh - Commercial rates for Internet links in the Uk are shockingly high at the moment.

A ping of 10 when home broadband was just sperm

Do you rememeber the MCW and quakeworld 1.0? I can remember when a ping <100 was lpb and anything under 300 considered not bad at all

*waves walking stick as he reminises about the good old days*

M

 

[Honza]

Hey Honza - don't tempt me - I fancy a trip to the czech rep

And I wasn't mentioning famous Pilsner Urquell beer hand-made samples purely from brewery cellars ;-) (here in CZ it's being given in pints)



THx for explanation of the edu system

 

[Louster]

By the way, just thought I'd bump this thread to say they fixed it a while back. Know what it turned out to be?







There was a "rogue machine" on the network with a duff network card, spamming and essentially DoSing the router.
In other words, something that should have been completely, utterly, ludicrously easy to detect and fix, but which they took more than 2 months to sort out, all the while blaming "chat programs". Anyone still in any doubt that my IT department is totally inept?

 

[TdC]

I bet they still think that IM clients are evil though Louster

 

[Catsby]

Catsby remebers Janet and NORMAN.

Castbsy also remebers being able to host servers that had a very impressive ping even from the USA, and playing on the old Wireplay servers with a circa 10ms ping.....
Catsby still liked to complain about lag.

 

[Tom]

Catsby would be one of those players who didn't run around the corner fast enough then