Description
CDes IT provides support for departmental (shared) storage space (typically referred to as the "G: drive,") "Class Folders," and redirected desktop/My Documents storage (PC-only). At this time, the shared storage is supported by college-maintained storage infrastructure. The Class Folder and redirected desktop space is provided by OIT's Storage Services group.
Departmental storage is a space configured for use by members of a department. There are three standard subdirectories provided for each department: INBOX, OUTBOX, and WORK. As the names suggest, INBOX is intended to be a place for CDes faculty and staff who are not a part of the workgroup to "drop" files they wish to share. OUTBOX is a folder set to read-only for everyone outside the workgroup and is used to provide access to departmental documents that the group wants to share with the college as a whole (e.g., payroll forms, policy documents, etc...). The WORK folder is restricted to only the members of the workgroup and is intended for storing work documents shared amongst members of the workgroup. The default allocation for a departmental workgroup is 150 GB. In some situations, a fourth folder, COLLAB, will exist in a workgroup's parent directory. This folder is set up to facilitate shared work between workgroups.
The Class Folders service is provided, by request, to faculty who wish to share electronic data with students enrolled in a CDes course. There is an online form that can be used to make requests to set up student access. The default quota for a Class Folder is 20 GB.
Desktop/My Documents folder redirection provides between 5 and 20 GB of storage per individual in the college. The default allocation is 5 GB for staff and 20 GB for faculty. PC users get this service automatically with offline folder synchronization via Active Directory group policy. Mac users have access to this storage (and departmental and Class Folder) but it is not automatic. Typically the Command-K (Connect to Server) function is pre-configured with the appropriate connection strings.
All of these storage services are configured for shadow copies so restoring/rolling back changes to individual files is a straightforward process. CDes IT maintains a tape backup for the departmental storage service for situations that can't be handled with shadow copies.
Off-campus access is possible with the use of VPN services.