Application Support

Who We Are

What We Do

We are a team with over 140 years of collective experience managing and developing applications and systems for Stanford University.  Our team is responsible for the ongoing support of numerous applications and tools used across campus. These applications and tools support various functions across campus. In order to successfully support many of these tools, we are required to intimately understand the underlying business processes and terminology behind the tools we support e.g. security best practices for door hardware, billing processes, and ITIL processes to name a few.

The bulk of the tools that we support are Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) applications that have been customized or configured to meet the needs of Stanford University. Additionally, we develop custom applications where an affordable COTS solution does not exist or does not meet the needs of the university.

Our team spends roughly 50% of our time developing and implementing new or upgraded solutions and the balance of the time is spent performing the operational functions required to support our tools and maintain high uptime percentages.

Ongoing Support includes the following functions: configuration, system and application administration, security, maintenance, system and application enhancements and upgrades, application development, testing and troubleshooting, customer outreach, documentation and reporting, training, vendor relations, and product management.

Security and Access Control

Lenel

Lenel OnGuard is the application that enables access control, alarm monitoring, digital video, intrusion detection, asset tracking, information security integration, credential production, and employee and visitor management functionality.

• Additional Information
• For more help with Lenel OnGuard, please submit a HelpSU request.

CSGold

CSGold is the application that enables access to a variety of facilities and services across the Stanford campus via the Stanford ID Card. Those services and facilities include access controls to doors buildings and rooms as well as the ability to purchase at Residence Halls and participating campus cafes, vending machines, as well as copying and printing machines in the libraries.

• Additional Information
• For more help with the Photo Submission Tool, please submit a HelpSU request.

Video Management

A new service to Stanford, we have currently implemented a video management system in the following locations: Windover, Anderson Art Center, Forsythe Hall, NDCCH, and the Stanford Research Computing Center to name a few. The intent of video surveillance on campus is to monitor locations such as data centers and facilities containing high value assets . The video management system is integrated with Lenel Access Control system.

Card services custom applications

Batch Access Level Assignment Tool was developed in house to support onboarding of buildings or batch changes to building assignments. It empowers building managers with the ability to batch assign or de-assign access in the Lenel OnGuard system.

Online Photo Submission Tool was developed in house. The photo submission tool is a web application that allows students (and staff) to upload a photo to be used on their Campus ID card. The tool was designed with a cropping function much like what people are accustomed to when setting their profile picture on Facebook. This solution leverages the following technologies and systems: Apache, PHP, Oracle, MySQL, jQuery, jQuery UI, and Jcrop. Almost 80% of the project is written in JavaScript, which is where we see today's web efforts.

• ID Card Photo Submission tool
• For more help with the Photo Submission Tool, please submit a HelpSU request.

SNSR

Stanford Network Self-Registration (SNSR) is a service which allows for user registration of devices onto the Stanford Network. Registration takes place via a web application SNSR followed by a client Stanford Network Registration Tool (SNRT). The product is available on both the wired and wireless networks. This product is a collaborative effort across IT Services, including Networking, Desktop Systems, ISO, and Application Support. We are responsible for development, integration, deployment, and support of the web application into Stanford's environment.

• Additional Information
• For more help with SNSR, please submit a HelpSU request.

IT Service Management

Aperture

Aperture is an application for data center facilities management. Aperture provides asset management, a way to document the floor layout and what is in each rack, forming an important database of details needed for efficient operation. It is a consolidated, web-based platform that stores data being collected by many Computing Services workgroups for inventory of all passive and active equipment that is hosted in the IT Services-managed spaces.

• For more help with Aperture, please submit a HelpSU request.

M.A.P.

COMING SOON! We are in the process of developing a new application that will be used to replace a tool used predominantly by our IT Operations Center.  This tool aggregates alert information received from about 20 monitoring subsystems which in turn monitor about 1000 servers, 5000 doors and 2000 networking devices.

Metrics Dashboards

Metrics and Monitoring Dashboard are available on the IT Metrics dashboard. The Status and Metrics "traffic lights" on the IT Services Home Page indicate the availability of key systems. In this program, gadgets are real-time graphical representations of metrics. They can be grouped into a dashboard,which is simply a container, and displayed on your browser screen. Application Support provides development and maintenance support for many of the monitoring gadgets made available on the campus dashboard.

• dashboard.stanford.edu
• For more help with Metrics and Monitoring, please submit a HelpSU request.

Remedy

Remedy is the application behind Stanford's central online help request form HelpSU. This system allows schools, departments, and central offices to track user service requests (Incident Management). Remedy is also the application behind Stanford's central Change Management system. The objective of Change Management is to ensure that standardized methods and techniques are used for efficient and prompt handling of IT changes, in order to prevent change-related incidents.

Remedy Incident Management

• helpsu.stanford.edu
• Additional Information
• Advisory Board
• For more help with Remedy, please submit a HelpSU request.

Remedy Change Management

• change.stanford.edu
• For more help with Remedy Change Management, please submit a HelpSU request.

HelpSU Portal: This primary portal allows staff, faculty, students, parents, researchers, or anyone in the world to submit Incidents or Help Requests for any of the 1600 agents in the 350 Support Groups on campus to field.

• helpsu.stanford.edu
• Additional Information
• For more help with Remedy, please submit a HelpSU request.

Custom HelpSU Portals: Application Support provides the coding and operational support for the campus web portals into the campus Remedy system. Custom portals allow for a school or department to brand their portal and customize the menu selections to fit the needs of their unit.

Some custom portals we have developed and support are:

• main campus HelpSU portal for submitting trouble and support requests (http://helpsu.stanford.edu/);
• Residential and Dining Enterprises portal (http://rdehelpsu.stanford.edu/);
• Graduate School of Business portal (https://remedyweb.stanford.edu/helpsu/gsb/);
• and the backend of the BenefitSU support page (from https://benefitsu.stanford.edu/).

HelpSU Mobile is an application developed for use with mobile devices. This application allows Remedy Licensed Users to update, close, and re-assign tickets while away from their desktop/laptop. It is built to be mobile-aware using ARSPerl for Remedy integration and jQueryMobile to handle delivery Remedy tickets to the mobile device.  Basic HTML and jQuery/JavaScript are also in use within the site.  The design work was prototyped using the Codiqa prototyping tool, and the code base should work across iOS, Android, and Windows 7 mobile devices.  

• helpsumobile.stanford.edu or remedyweb.stanford.edu/m/
• Additional Information
• For more help with Mobile HelpSU, please submit a HelpSU request.

Service Alerts

Service Alerts is an application developed to manage communications relating to system outages or advisories.  The application contains a Public View and an Internal View  to allow for the IT Operations Center and Subject Matter Experts to capture data about the outage and it's impact and disseminate information to the impacted users or entire campus. The application is integrated with Remedy.

• italerts.stanford.edu

Financial and Resource Management

Cashnet eBill

Cashnet eBill is an online tool that allows IT Services to automate manual billing and processing functions and allows our GAR clients to view and pay their bills online.

• For more help with Cashnet eBill, please submit a HelpSU request.

PMG iRequest and iDeliver

PMG is the legacy application behind OrderIT, a web-based tool available for authorized users in schools and departments to view monthly IT Services statements, request services, and view online service information. iRequest is an e-commerce web store interface, providing the user a familiar online shopping experience. iDeliver is a tool which allows us to easily configure business process actions such as approvals, rules, task assignments in order to fulfill complex orders for IT Services. These two tools together make up the interface that our campus will be able to use to order services this year.

• orderit.stanford.edu
• Additional Information
• For more help with OrderIT, please submit a HelpSU Request.

Timesheet

Unanet is the web-based time tracking tool that IT Services uses internally to track staff work time. The organization uses the data collected for two purposes: Accurately set rates for services and accurately report on staff resources supporting projects.

• timesheet.stanford.edu
• For more help with Unanet, please submit a HelpSU request.

Custom Voice Applications

Voicemail Reset Portal

Leveraging the Movius API, we have released an administrative tool to assist in self service voicemail password password resets. The tool is not currently available for all users due to the data in the disparate phone systems and the construct on how phone numbers are owned. The tool greatly improves logging and allows a large population of users the ability reset their passwords.

SIPdb

COMING SOON! The team is currently working on understanding this tool which was developed in Communications Services to manage phone numbers for Stanford University.  This tool is developed in Python and integrates with OrderIT for the purpose of provisioning phone numbers on campus. This tool also integrates with the Voicemail Password Reset tool.

Integration Development

Bomgar/Remedy Integration

We are currently working on a proof of concept of Bomgar as a Remedy integrated chat and remote control solution for our central Help Desk with the intent of sharing with other support desks on campus.

Cloudpath/SNSR Integration

We are currently developing the integration between SNSR and Cloudpath to deliver certificates to endpoints.

CSGold/uniFLOW Integration

We are currently developing the integration between CSGold and uniFLOW to allow students to print using their Stanford card plan with Academic Computing's proposed centralized print solution.

CrashPlan ProE Dashboard

Using the CrashPlan API, we are currently developing a dashboard that will allow individual to retrieve information about their backed up devices.

Integration Support

AlertSU

Campus Emergency Notification (AlertSU): The Application Support team provides integration support for the AlertSU/campus mass notification and the processing of contacts from outside Stanford's network.

Compliance Registry/NetDB Integration

We currently support the integration between the Compliance Registry and NetDB.

Xerox/Remedy Integration

We provide support for the integration between Xerox and Remedy for University HR that we developed.

More Information

For additional details about Application Support, contact Anne Pinkowski.