The Barnard Help Desk does not handle computing issues in Plimpton Hall or Cathedral Gardens during the summer of 2008.

Residents should report all problems to the Residence Director from Educational Housing Services.   

Send an email to Plimpton@studenthousing.org  or Cathedral@studenthousing.org 

or leave a message at the office phone: 212-854-1057 

Overview:

• In Plimpton:

  • The CBS phone system is not compatible with modems. You need a network card in your computer to connect to the College network.

  • Barnard provides simple DHCP access to the campus network. Most visitors will be able to connect to the Internet without assistance. Visitors must keep their personal computers secure by following our Mandatory Computer Setup Guidelines. Computers that are "compromised" are blocked from the Barnard network.

  • Captured computers.   If you are captured by our system, your computer will not connect to the Internet.  It will connect only to the Capture Page.  If you do not see the Capture Page, you have not been captured and there is some other reason that your computer can not connect to the Internet.  Test your computer at another jack in Plimpton and at a jack off the Barnard campus.  See details below.

  • Problems with network jacks in the individual rooms: 

    • If the jack is broken (Face plate missing, jack hanging off wall, jack recessed, wires exposed): report this to the Residence Director.

    • If  there is no connectivity: 

      • adjust the computer for half duplex:  

        Switching to Half-Duplex: Sometimes your computer's ethernet speed conflicts with your network jack's speed. You can resolve this problem by following the steps on this page: http://www.barnard.edu/resnet/halfduplex.html

      • try a different computer at that jack before reporting it to the Residence Director

      • also, the user should test his computer at a known working jack in Plimpton

    • The Residence Director reports broken jacks to AT after all tests have been completed. We will notify the appropriate group that a repair is needed. The Residence Director will be responsible for arranging access to the individual room. 

  • Wireless access: This building does not have a wireless network. Visitors are not permitted to install wireless access points or routers in Plimpton Hall. If we discover an illegal unit, we will disable that jack for the summer and will capture the Mac address of the router.

• In Cathedral Gardens

  • Time Warner's Road Runner service provides access to the internet in this building.  For connection guidelines, see: http://www.barnard.edu/resnet/cathedralgardens.html.  If this does not solve the problem, report this to the Residence Director.

  • The CBS phone system is not compatible with modems. You need a network card in your computer to connect to Time Warner.

  • Wireless access: This building does not have a wireless network.

• The general visitor guidelines are posted at http://www.barnard.columbia.edu/at/Visitors.html. 

Details:

The Mandatory Computer Set-up for visitors http://www.barnard.edu/resnet/mcs-2005-non-bc.pdf  explains how users can protect their computers. An infected computer will be captured and blocked from the network until it is properly cleaned. This requires the user to reformat the hard drive, reinstall the operating system and reinstall all applications including anti-virus software.

The Capture Program blocks computers from accessing the internet and directs the user to a special web page at http://10.1.96.2/  (See copy of Capture Page). 
The user should determine the Ethernet Hardware Address of the captured computer by following the instructions on that page (and at this link). The Residence Director can send an email to AT to learn whether this is a case of:

1. a compromised computer -

   • To be reconnected to the internet, the user must have the computer thoroughly cleaned of viruses and trojans. This requires the user to back up all files and documents, reformat the hard drive, reinstall the operating system and reinstall all applications from the original disks. If the user needs assistance, we recommend Techs in a Sec at 1-866-NYC-TECH, http://www.techsinasec.com . You should advise visitors to bring their original software disks with them.

   • The Residence Director will notify AT when this is completed. AT will remove that computer from the capture list.  If the computer is compromised and captured a second time, it will not be reconnected to the network.

2. a violation of copyright - 

   • The user will not be reconnected to the internet.

Copyright: All network users must comply with federal copyright law regarding downloading/use of audio and video material. If we receive a complaint about a specific computer, we will permanently block access to the internet. See http://www.barnard.columbia.edu/at/copyright.html. Copying, distributing, sharing, downloading, or uploading any information or material on the Internet may infringe the copyright for that information or material. The University is legally required to take action to cause the infringing activity to cease. In addition to any University action, the copyright owner may also take further legal action against the individual concerned.  See the advice posted for students at the University: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/gsas/sub/orientation/2007/piracy/index.html

Staff information
last update 01/08/08