ICT ready to enable business continuity

During the last two weeks the IT environment at SU pulled out all stops to prepare a virtual study and work environment.

Since the announcement of lock-down regulations by the President on 23d March, the possible work scenarios are now much more limited. The restriction of movement and staying at home will effectively terminate 99% of all traditional work or study activities on campus and will now be done online, from home.

This scenario has specific implications for all IT services and applications. Our goal is to enable all ICT-based services and applications to staff and students working from home, with the same richness and quality that existed before.

The preparation covered multiple domains, some of which we can control, and others where we depend on collaboration of service providers and national negotiations in this regard. The preparation of all computing facilities on campus for remote access will be finalised over this coming weekend, after the scheduled maintenance work is completed.

The ICT service desk (ICT Partner Portal) is currently inundated by support requests like access to applications and platforms. The support agents and system engineers are doing their utmost to serve everybody as soon as possible, and we appreciate the patience of our users.

I’m confident that SU will overcome the short-term challenges, and that the ICT ecosystem will enable business continuity off-campus. We’re almost there!

Attie Juyn (Senior Director: ICT)