Newspapers / Brevard College Student Newspaper / Jan. 22, 2010, edition 1 / Page 5
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Jan. 22, 2010 | The Clarion Opinion Internet issues? You're not alone Page 5 by Travis Taylor Opinion Editor Ah, the smell of hundreds of students and their opinions. As a new Spring semester begins here atBrevard College, many students will air their thoughts amongst friends new and old, and many new relationships will begin based upon commonality of opinion. In the spirit of making wholesome connections, I would like to present my own opinion on a subject that will be familiar to many readers, specifically, the state of our internet connectivity on campus. In the past, I personally have had an absolutely terrible time with wireless internet access around campus. I have also been frustrated by the molasses-fast speed of even the school’s hard coimections, such as those in classrooms and the various labs available The first issue, that of wireless access, has manifested itself mostly as a disappearing coimection, usually when trying to email a just-completed assigimient. While the wireless router identity always remains detectable by my computer, the actual coimection disappears. This, I understand, is a server failure. In these occurrences, physically moving between routers, such as walking from the library to the AEC, does not solve the problem, since the individual routers are fine, but the server that ties them together is apparently overloaded. The second issue is even more simple than the first, I think. The speed of hardwired coimections can be limited in only a few ways, one being the actual method of connection, which cannot be the problem, since I have been told that new high-capacity fiber-optic cable has been laid around campus. This eliminates any potential bottleneck in connectivity amongst hardwired computers. Another possibility is server speed and/or capacity, as with the first issue. Thinking about the commonalities between these issues raises more questions (and answers, such as the truth that disappearing connectivity has nothing whatsoever to do with whether a connection is held by a computer running Mac or Windows, sorry IT.) If the servers are not the issue, what is? The only possibility, other than a voodoo curse upon EC’s campus network, is an inadequate level of bandwidth as supphedby the College’s service provider This would necessarily lead to server problems. I am certainly not an expert on networking, or even computers in general, but I have been around them long enough to know that some issues cannot be solved by the technical expertise of the IT Department, although those intrepid souls take most of the initial heat caused by frustration with internet issues. If servers or lack of available bandwidth is indeed the problem, the solution will only be found by spending money to upgrade our hardware or our connection. This is bad news, obviously, because I doubt that internet comfort is as high on the College’s list of financial priorities as most of us would like. Ideally, an article such as this one would spur discussion and constructive action towards a solution, but the existence of a Facebook group titled “Project: End EC Apathy” would seem to indicate that there are few of us that care enough to make an effort toward activist ends. Here’s hoping that I, and the members of End EC Apathy, are wrong. We all stand to benefit from having our opinions, and airing them in a positive manner, especially when our access to mass Youtube distraction is restricted. Comic bv Karam Boeshaar DAX AND KEVJN - It Awt RotKe't 5tVtr\ce Ok it It
Brevard College Student Newspaper
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Jan. 22, 2010, edition 1
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