EASI

Enterprise Applications and Solutions Integration

News

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Removal of Question-Based-Authentication for ESS/MSS

Date:  October 2, 2024
To:  AMS Listserv
From:  Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration and the Division of People Strategy, Equity & Culture
Re: Removal of Question-Based-Authentication for ESS/MSS

 

Dear Staff Members,

To enhance the user experience and improve security across U of T applications, Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI) and the Division of People Strategy, Equity & Culture (PSEC) will be removing question-based-authentication from Employee Self-Service (ESS) and Manager Self-Service (MSS) on November 2, 2024, during yearly system and application maintenance.

UTORMFA will also be enforced for ESS/MSS, Employee Reimbursement Direct Deposit, My Research, and the Capital Projects Portal.

After November 2, new staff and faculty members will no longer sign up for question-based-authentication, and will be required to sign up for UTORMFA, U of T’s multi-factor authentication solution.

View of Question-Based-Authentication that will be removed from ESS/MSS on November 2:

 

screenshot of question-based-authentication

If you have any questions about this change, please contact Prashanth Premkumar, EASI Project Manager, at prashanth.premkumar@utoronto.ca

For questions about access to ESS/MSS, please submit a service request in the HR Service Centre.

Sincerely,

Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration and
The Division of People Strategy, Equity & Culture

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U of T 30-day Microsoft Teams Chat Retention Protocol in effect after 5pm October 1, 2024 

Date: October 1, 2024
To: EITU, MTRC, InfoTech, AMS, Broader Channels
From: Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration
Re: U of T 30-day Microsoft Teams Chat Retention Protocol in effect after 5pm October 1, 2024 

 

Dear colleagues,

Following on the Sep 23, 2024 final reminder memo on Teams Chat Retention, the University of Toronto’s implementation of a 30-day retention protocol for all individual Teams Chats, will begin after 5:00pm on Tuesday, October 1, 2024. These are messages that occur outside of a Microsoft Teams Channel.

If you have any urgent concerns regarding your MS Teams Chat, please submit a ticket via https://uoft.me/m365help immediately.

Important: Teams Chats deleted by a retention protocol are permanently removed and cannot be recovered. The new Teams Chat Retention protocol will be applied to all UofT Teams users.

To review more FAQs to help you prepare, visit U of T Teams Chat Retention Protocol website.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

 

Kind regards,

Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI)

Information Technology Services (ITS)

University of Toronto

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Count and Registration Cleanup

Join us for a Connect+Learn session on Count and Registration Cleanup. The Enrolment Count is performed three times annually by Planning & Budget (P&B) for the internal distribution of funding, enrolment projection, and divisional planning. These statistics are sent to the Ministry of Colleges and Universities to monitor future funding allocations.

This session will guide staff in academic units through the process of interpreting the initial count procedures instructions from P&B. Topics will include:

  • What action to take when you receive the Count Procedures Email Notification from P&B
  • Financial Cancellation (“FINCA”) timelines and procedures
  • ROSI Pre-Count Diagnostics
  • ROSI screens that will be useful for reviewing registration or activity status changes

Staff from Planning & Budget will be presenting this session with the EASI-SIS team.

Resources

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EASI Go Prod NGSIS Updates – July 1 to September 30, 2024 

Date: September 30, 2024   
To: ROSI Users; ROSI Express Users
From: Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration 
Re: EASI Go Prod NGSIS Updates – July 1 to September 30, 2024 

 

Hi everyone,

Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI) would like to update you on the latest major production releases and updates for the NGSIS program and student systems. The following are major changes from July 1 to September 30, 2024:

Accommodated Testing Services (ATS)

Accommodated Testing Services coordinates on-campus assessment accommodations for students with disabilities who are enrolled in in-class courses offered on the St. George Campus. ATS has released the following enhancements:

  • Introduced instructor emailing functionality: ATS staff can now manage course contacts and send various instructor notification emails. This new system replaces the older one, offering a modern user interface and reducing the number of systems needed for business processes.

Course Information System (CIS)

The Course Information System streamlines syllabi and exams processes for instructors and administrators. The following improvements have been introduced: 

  • Various general improvements and many specific enhancements were made for the Faculty of Arts & Science (FAS), the University of Toronto Scarborough (UTSC), the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering (FASE), and the Faculty of Music.
  • Department Administrators at FAS, UTSC, and FASE can now create Change Requests in the Syllabus Builder module. Change Requests allow administrative staff to send questions to their instructors and request modifications to submissions, directly within CIS.

Curriculum Publisher (CP)

The Curriculum Publisher is an online application that allows divisions and departments to publish course and program offerings. Between July 1 and September 30, divisional calendars were published for the following areas: John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design; the Faculty of Medicine’s MD Program; and the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy.

eMarks

eMarks enables the online submission of course grades and amended grades. It also allows instructors and departments to track any changes made to a student’s grade. The following improvements have been introduced:

  • Introduced a streamlined authentication process.
  • Fixed an issue where the hidden course functionality would become unresponsive when attempting to hide or unhide courses.

Student Information Systems (SIS) Core Systems

The administrative core systems, including ROSI, ROSI Express, and OASIS, completed the following major releases:

  • Completed improvements for the University of Toronto Advanced Planning for Students (UTAPS) 2024-25 payment journal and reconciliation process.
  • Completed the Ontario Education Number (OEN) process for the upcoming Summer, Fall, and Winter sessions.
  • Completed an enhancement to support scholarship deferrals in ACORN.
  • Completed database performance improvements for the ROSI to SAP data feeds.

The student core systems, including ACORN and Degree Explorer, completed the following major releases:

  • Enhanced fee deferral functionality to allow scholarship recipients to defer their fees directly in ACORN.
  • Made updates to the Student Equity Census in ACORN.
  • Completed technical improvements and monitoring to support course enrolment in ACORN.
  • Enhanced the program assessment functionality in Degree Explorer.
  • Onboarded the Computer Science graduate department and added a new Department Admin role in Degree Explorer.

Timetable Builder (TTB)

The Timetable Builder application allows students to easily create and optimize their course schedules with a convenient, user-friendly and accessible user experience. Between July 1 and September 30 the following improvements were introduced:

  • Scheduling information for the Faculty of Information was added to the application, and administrative users were added to the administrative interface in the Online Administrative Student Information System (OASIS).
  • Fixed an issue where using the breadth/distribution requirements filter did not return results with partial wildcard.
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EASI Go Prod AMS & Enterprise Shared Services Updates – June 1 to September 30, 2024

Date: September 30, 2024   
To:  AMS and Enterprise Shared Services Users
From:  Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration 
Re:  EASI Go Prod AMS & Enterprise Shared Services Updates – June 1 to September 30, 2024

 

Hi everyone,

Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI) would like to update you on the latest major production releases and updates for U of T’s Administrative Management Systems (AMS) and Enterprise Shared Services.

The following are major changes from June 1 to September 30, 2024:

Administrative Management Systems

SAP GUI Upgrade

U of T has been transitioning to the new version of SAP GUI as the current version is no longer supported. Digital Workplace clients have received the upgrade from SAP GUI 7.6 (Patch 6) to version 8.00 (Patch 4), and IT administrators have been facilitating the upgrade for divisions. To date, more than 90 per cent of users have logged in to SAP GUI 8.00. The new version includes performance improvements, and enhanced stability and security, and represents minimal change to business processes. Completion for this upgrade is targeted for October 2024.

Human Resources Information System

TA Administrative Management System Analysis and Recommendations (June)

Beginning in June, EASI kicked off a series of consultations to identify and document the various administrative processes and tools used to manage the “recruitment-to-hire” of Teaching Assistants (TAs). These wide-ranging sessions with business process owners and IT leaders from Single Department Faculties (SDFs), Multi-Department Faculties, and campuses captured current manual processes, custom applications, and areas of improvement. Recommendations and a business case describing a short- and long-term vision for a pan-University TA Administrative Management solution will be presented this fall.

Retiree Benefits Administration and UPP Transition (August)

Working closely with the Division of People Strategy, Equity & Culture (PSEC) and University Pension Plan (UPP) teams, a number of changes have been implemented to the Human Resources Information System (HRIS), supporting the transition of services to UPP and the administration of retiree benefits. HR partners and business officers should reference recent PSEC memos for detailed changes.

Work Study Top-up Enhancement (September 1)

In conjunction with PSEC, on September 1 the EASI/HRIS team implemented a streamlined process for Work Study top-ups. The total hourly rate for Work Study can now be entered directly in the Time Data screen when processing pay in HRIS. The Work Study Program Hiring and Payment Procedure has been updated to reflect the enhancement and is available on the HRIS SharePoint site.

Research Information System

UTRAC Inter-Institutional Agreements Template Generator (August)

The My Research team recently launched a new feature in UTRAC – the University of Toronto Research Accounts tool – that allows the Division of the Vice-President, Research & Innovation (VPRI) research officers to generate a fully editable draft inter-institutional agreement (IIA) for sub-award transfers using an existing template with auto-filled data from the grant record. This feature saves staff considerable time and effort on IIA creation and data entry, and ensures consistency of legal terms on these important institutional agreements.

Enterprise Shared Services

L4 SharePoint Site Template (June 7)

On June 7, the L4 SharePoint site template was made available for use across U of T. This enables users to upload L3 and L4 content on SharePoint, with some exceptions. To accommodate sensitive data, this template has restrictions to ensure data is secured. Read the full announcement.

LISTSERV Server OS Upgrade (August 19)

On August 19, U of T’s LISTSERV server successfully underwent a scheduled upgrade to migrate to a supported operating system, as the previous operating system had reached its end of life and was no longer supported. LISTSERV administrative functions remained unchanged and there was no change to the end-user experience.

30-day Microsoft Teams Chat Retention Protocol (September 30)

Effective September 30, all individual Teams chats will be subject to a 30-day retention period. Individual Teams chats will be permanently deleted after 30 days. This Retention Protocol is implemented to enhance records management and ensure data security. Three rounds of communications have been circulated through various channels across the three campuses to reach to all Teams users. Additionally, three information sessions have been conducted to help users navigate this change. Learn more about the 30-day Microsoft Teams Chat Retention Protocol and recommendations to prepare for this change.

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Final Reminder: U of T 30-day Microsoft Teams Chat Retention Protocol coming September 30 

Date: September 23, 2024
To: EITU, MTRC, InfoTech, AMS, Broader Channels
From: Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration
Re: Final Reminder: U of T 30-day Microsoft Teams Chat Retention Protocol coming September 30 

 

Dear colleagues,  

Following on the Sep 12, 2024 reminder memo on Teams Chat Retention, the University of Toronto will be implementing a 30-day retention protocol for all individual Teams Chats, effective September 30, 2024. These are messages that occur outside of a Microsoft Teams Channel.   

Important: Teams Chats deleted by a retention protocol are permanently removed and cannot be recovered. The new Teams Chat Retention protocol will be applied to all UofT Teams users.   

To review more FAQs to help you prepare, visit U of T Teams Chat Retention Protocol website.   

Thank you for your attention to this matter. 

 

Kind regards,    

Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI)  

Information Technology Services (ITS)  

University of Toronto  

 

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ActiveX will be disabled by default in Microsoft Office Apps

Date: September 23, 2024
To:  InfoTech Listserv
From: Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration
Re: ActiveX will be disabled by default in Microsoft Office Apps

Dear colleagues,

Microsoft Is disabling default ActiveX Controls in Microsoft 365 apps from April 2025 and Office 2024 (from October 2024) to improve security. The default configuration setting for ActiveX objects will change from Prompt me before enabling all controls with minimal restrictions to Disable all controls without notification. The new default setting is equivalent to the existing DisableAllActiveX group policy setting.

What you need to do to prepare:

When this change takes effect, if you need to use ActiveX controls in Office documents, you can change back to the previous default behavior using any one of the following methods:

Kind regards,

Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI)  

Information Technology Services (ITS)  

University of Toronto  

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VBS deprecation 

Date: September 23, 2024
To:  InfoTech Listserv
From: Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration
Re: VBS deprecation 

Dear colleagues,

According to official announcements from Microsoft, the Visual Basic Scripting Edition (VBScript) is being deprecated.

VBScript is a coding language that has been widely used by developers to add dynamic interactivity and functionality to web pages. Deprecation starts in the second half of 2024 and will be entirely removed from future Windows OS releases.

What you need to do to prepare:

If you have websites or applications that still run on VBScript, we recommend migrating to either PowerShell or JavaScript and other alternatives. VBScript will be available as features on demand (FODs) until sometime around 2027.

Will the retirement of VBScript impact Visual Basic for Applications (VBA)?

    1. In the initial phase of VBScript deprecation, there should be no immediate impact on existing VBA solutions. You can continue using your VBA scripts as usual.

    2. Future Phases: As the deprecation progresses, future phases might introduce changes that could affect VBA, especially if your VBA projects rely on VBScript components.

More information is available on the Microsoft official announcement page.

Kind regards,

Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI)  

Information Technology Services (ITS)  

University of Toronto  

 

 

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Teams Chat Retention Protocol – Session 03 (Final Reminder)

This is the 3rd information session regarding the upcoming Teams Chat Retention Protocol, a repetition of the first two information sessions we conducted in June, 2024. In this session covered:

 

Resources:

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Important Update for Microsoft Forms Users | Microsoft Forms – Data sync to Excel

Microsoft Forms now supports a new, more reliable data sync to Microsoft Excel for the web. The old data sync will be replaced on October 20, 2024. 

What You Need to Do: 

 

Key Dates: 

 

Impact: 

 

Note: 

The new data sync can only be triggered in Excel for the web. To get new Forms response data in the Excel desktop app, open the file in Excel for the web first.