A hot summer and aging equipment has prompted the early arrival of a new AMS website.
Although the student government’s myams.org website was completely redesigned in the summer of 2004, another new website had been in the works and was quickly made available online in early August due to the unexpected failure of the web server.
“[Due to] heat and age, the motherboard on the web server failed,” said John Paterson, AMS information technology officer. “We were planning a website redesign in any case, but [this] made us do it sooner. “We were working on [the new site] when the web server failed; we put up [the new site] to make the information available to students.” The new website is not yet complete.
Paterson said there are many features to be added, and the appearance of the site will change again. The current appearance of the website is a result of the scramble to make the information on the AMS website available to students following the server failure, he said.
“We are hoping to re-skin it with our nice shiny new look for it by the end of next week, adding in different modules and components throughout the term and getting everything done in time for January,” Paterson said, adding that at the same time, the University will unveil its own new website.
Paterson said the version of the site was initially conceived as a way to better integrate the AMS and University websites, making the site easier for AMS staff to update, and update the servers.
David Rodriguez, ArtSci ’06, said he liked the interim look for the website.
“The layout is nice, more aesthetically pleasing,” he said.
Olivia Oulton, ArtSci ’08, said she had a few complaints.
“I couldn’t find the Marketplace,” she said, referring to the online classifieds section for students. “I bought a lot of stuff from it, my bed and a TV stand.” Additional features on the new AMS website include student fee opt-outs and an improved USAT website, which will contain year-end course evaluation results.
“We are handling opt-outs for undergraduates on our new web server, roughly all 13,500 undergrads, med students, all opt-outs as well as Health and Dental opt-outs,” Paterson said.
Rodriguez said this relocation of opt-outs will be helpful to students.
“It will probably make it a bit more accessible for people who don’t know about opt-out,” he said.
All final editorial decisions are made by the Editor(s) in Chief and/or the Managing Editor. Authors should not be ed, targeted, or harassed under any circumstances. If you have any grievances with this article, please direct your comments to [email protected].