Overview
Background
The Scientia Enterprise applications are the University's chosen application suite for providing a shared academic Timetabling service. The Scientia applications also provide an ad-hoc Room booking service for Staff and Students via Web Room Booking.
The Scientia applications work on a separate database for each academic year. Each year, there are therefore tasks to create the new database and instances of each application for the next academic year. The roll-forward tasks take place in stages at appropriate times in the calendar and the applications are then re-pointed at the switch-over. For the 2021/22 academic year, this switch-over for LIVE feeds was carried out in the 3rd week in July 2020.
The start of the new Timetabling year in 2022/23 will be Mon 25-July 2022
This is compliance work that is too large to be delivered within the current support budget and is therefore run as a project each year.
Scope
The scope of this project is restricted to the tasks required to roll forward the timetabling and room booking applications for use for the 2022-23 Academic Year. The roll forward tasks are as documented on the Wiki and include any decommissioning tasks.
This year, there are additional tasks for the following
- a required upgrade to CalSync which was delayed from the previous roll-forward project
- complete the same CalSync upgrade for exam scheduling
- Moving the XML Data Feed for Bookable Rooms to remove reliance on the ColdFusion platform
The following are not in the scope of this project:
- Decommissioning of 20/21 database as this is required for historic reporting
- Remedial or enhancement work to resolve existing issues unrelated to the roll-forward project
- Investigation or resolution of existing LIVE production infrastructure issues
Objectives
The key objective for the project is to deliver the roll forward to allow activities (lectures, tutorials, labs, other misc classes) and rooms to be scheduled and allocation carried out for the new academic year.
Deliverables
The following deliverables have been identified for completion of the roll forward
Ref | Deliverables | Must Have/Should Have/Could Have |
D1 |
Resource Booker Upgrade
|
Must Have |
D2 |
CalSync Upgrade - Class Timetabling
|
Must Have |
D3 |
CalSync Upgrade - Exam Scheduling
|
Must Have |
D4 |
XML Feed to Bookable Rooms
|
Must Have |
D5 |
Core timetabling applications - Roll-forward
|
Must Have |
D6 |
Deliver web applications - Roll-forward
|
Must Have |
D7 |
Decommissioning tasks - 19/20;SDB / RDB & Web apps / 20-21;RDB & Web Apps
|
Must Have |
D8 |
Deliver incoming interfaces
|
Must Have |
D9 |
Deliver Course Timetable Browser
|
Must Have |
D10 |
Bookable Rooms Website
|
Must Have |
D11 |
Learn Feed
|
Must Have |
D12 |
Lecture Capture Feed
|
Must Have |
D13 |
Reporting
|
Must Have |
D14 |
CalSync
|
Must Have |
D15 |
Switchover academic year in July and service wrap
|
Must Have |
Benefits
This is a compliance project, and will allow 2022-23 Timetabling planning to occur from March 2022, and allow the Timetabling service to continue into the new academic year, 2022-23.
Success Criteria
The following criteria will confirm the project has been successful in each of its objectives:
- CalSync upgraded successfully
- ResourceBooker upgraded successfully
- XML feed to Bookable Rooms successfully moved
- UOE2022 SDB available in Scientia Enterprise by Jan 2022
- 22/23 Web Applications available by 31st January 2022
- In April 2022, incoming interfaces will start to populate 22-23 with data from IDM and EUGEX
- Course Timetable Browser, Bookable rooms, Calsync process, Learn outgoing interface, Lecture Capture feed and the BI Suite will be switched to point at 22-23 RDB at dates to be agreed with the business.
- From July 2022, all Web Applications will, by default, display/refer to 2022-23 as the current academic year when accessed by any user in the University.