Webmail crash causes further delays

Ariel users who expected their Webmail systems to be up and running again Friday had to wait a little longer. University Information Technology Services originally scheduled the server to be fixed Friday; however, Ariel users didn't gain access to their accounts until Sunday at 1:45 p.m.\nBecause of multiple failures on IMAP4, the mail storage server for Ariel, the system crashed Tuesday, leaving thousands of students at three IU campuses without access to their e-mail accounts.\nRick Jackson, manager of messaging for UITS said in an Oct. 14 Indiana Daily Student story that Ariel users could expect to use their e-mail accounts Friday. But because of more technical delays, UITS predicted the service to return sometime today. However, many students were surprised to find their e-mail accounts up and running Sunday afternoon.\nAfter trying for five days to access his e-mail, senior Jon Harari was relieved Sunday afternoon when he connected to his e-mail without any error messages.\n"I heard all of these rumors that it would take another week," he said. "But I tried everyday just to make sure. "I was so excited to see that my Inbox was over quota when I finally received my e-mail. Everything was still saved and in my Inbox."\nUITS employee Mike Trelinski said the latest UITS update, at noon Saturday, indicated data restoration had been going on around-the-clock and would continue over the weekend. But Trelinski said he was hopeful UITS would restore data over the weekend.\n"It's definitely a hardware and all of the parts had to be special ordered," he said. "I'm sure that those parts are the reason that it's taking so long."\nTrelinski said the UITS Support Center phone line has been "ringing off the hook" since Tuesday afternoon. He said students have been calling and complaining that they have lost internships and jobs because of the e-mail outage.\nSenior Jaclyn Miller checks her e-mail more than five times a day, as she is in the process of applying for jobs after graduation. When Miller realized her e-mail went down, she called UITS right away.\n"At first I thought it was just my account," Miller said. "But everyone else started to have the same problem."\nMiller has called UITS everyday since the outage seeking alternate solutions to receiving her e-mails.\n"They just kept extending the date," she said. "It's ridiculous. They basically told me I could do nothing."\nSenior Andrea Lewen, like Miller, has also called UITS and listened to their pre-recorded message pertaining to the outage. Lewen said after two days, she was tired of waiting for an answer about when her e-mail would return.\n"I finally just set up a Hotmail account," she said. "UITS has been no help at all. They could have at least told me how to forward my IU e-mails to another account."\nLewen said she is relieved that all of her folders, address book and old e-mails are still in her Ariel system.\nJunior Brett Rozanczyk said he felt like he lost communication with his teachers and is currently not up-to-date on his class assignments as a result of the Webmail problems.\n"It was literally the most frustrating thing in the world," he said. "I almost missed an exam Wednesday because I didn't receive an e-mail from my professor confirming the time and room."\nSenior Gwen Rosenthal said the outage has made her realize that so much of communication at IU relies on the Internet -- specifically e-mail.\n"When you take it away for an extended amount of time, it makes you realize just how much you need it," Rosenthal said. "I just felt out of touch all week when I couldn't access my Webmail."\nMiller said her patience has run out with UITS.\n"For all of the money we pay to go to school here, you'd think (UITS) could have done something to fix Webmail in a more timely manner," Miller said.\nJackson said UITS ordered new equipment this summer to replace the five-year-old Shakespeare systems, which he expects will be implemented during the spring semester.\nBrian Voss, associate vice president for telecommunications at IU, said the new environment not only involves brand new hardware, which in itself will improve reliability, but also a new architecture that will further improve the reliability and availability of e-mail as a service. He also said implementing the new technology will also mean standard quotas for student accounts will increase to 100 megabytes.\n"Using a new storage area network technology, the new environment will make failures a thing of the past," he said.\n-- Contact campus editor Lori Geller at lfgeller@indiana.edu.