Behind the scenes of the ICT department

Rob van Laar

The campus may be quiet and deserted, but at home everyone is working as best they can. We make extensive use of Webdrive, Citrix and VPN, we email more than ever and we’re increasingly using Skype for video calls. This puts a strain on our ICT environment. Rob van Laar is manager of the Shared Service Center of ICT, where everyone works hard to keep all systems in the air. “I am really proud of our department, if I look at the challenges we faced this past week.” The SSC-ICT department ensures, amongst other things, that the network and servers can handle demand, that we can all download software, but also that we can easily log in to applications such as Skype and TIM from home, using our TU Delft account. For all these applications and services, it is estimated how many colleagues use them on an average day and how much space is needed on the servers. “When it was announced that everyone had to work from home as much as possible, we immediately arranged extra server space. If we hadn't managed that so quickly, some systems would certainly have collapsed the next day”.

“We quickly focused on improving our Skype environment, to facilitate online meetings with colleagues”

An ICT/FM crisis team has been set up that links up with the TU-wide crisis team to determine what is most needed at that moment and what needs extra attention. For example, extra licences must be purchased for certain systems if more people want to use them at the same time. “For example, we quickly focused on improving our Skype environment, to facilitate online meetings with colleagues. In addition, monitoring the critical systems remains very important, because all servers are now running at full speed.” Meanwhile, Rob and his colleagues also get questions about why certain tools like Zoom or Microsoft Teams cannot be used at TU Delft. For the use of Zoom and other cloud applications, issues such as GDPR compliance and security need to be thoroughly checked beforehand, otherwise, the entire ICT environment is at risk. It is even more complex to use an application such as Teams at TU Delft, which requires a lot from the ICT environment, making it difficult to install such an application quickly. The fact that everyone works from home doesn't make working together any easier, but Rob appreciates the creativity of his team. “Like everyone else we had to adapt to the new situation, but my team came up with solutions from the word go. For example, we plan online coffee moments to keep in touch with each other. In the meantime, our colleagues from Workplace Services are still on campus to answer all kinds of questions”. In the near future, keeping the systems stable will be a priority, now that almost everyone has switched to working online. In addition, the crisis team has a number of items on their wish list, such as arranging software updates and passwords renewal remotely. Rob: “For the time being, we still have to work hard to support working from home even better, but it's a real achievement what we’ve accomplished last week.