Internet at the Residence Hall

[columbiatech]

These problems with the internet is complete **. Ever since I got to the residence hall all I've heard from the management is lies. I got there on the Friday before classes started before most tof the students arrived and the internet was working fine. Then all of a sudden as soon as the students start arriving the internet goes down, conviently when Digicel starts selling there phones to students. Hmmmmmmmmm sounds like SMU doesnt want students to use their Vonage phones because then they cant make money off students with Digicell. It really suprises me how much the management lies to us, and it truly is wrong because we pay so much for tuition and housing the least can be done is we be allowd to use vonage to call our friends and family back in the states and not be charged 25 cents a minute with Vonage to do so.

[skidoc42]

WOW! That's maby the dumbest thing I've ever heard...put the bottle down and hit the books. :P


skidoc42 :twisted:

[IMG DOC]

Dear Columbiatech,
Ski Doc 42 is on the mark, albeit somewhat harsh. I have attempted to counsel this young student in the finer points of political correctness and see I have more work to do. (Humor). When I was attending Medical School in the Caribbean (late '70's), the concerns were drinking water, electricity to study, water to bath and whether the Prof. was going to show in class to teach. The finer points of the internet and Vonage did not exist at that time. Getting adjusted to a new environment is never easy and desiring the security of being able to communicate with one's support system (at a reasonable price) is understood. Having monitored the boards lately, it is obvious that the Administration is having problems with the electronics service they wish their students to have. The best I can tell, the admin. has been "up front" with the problem and the students will eventually have what they want. Notice I didn't say, what the NEED.
The internet will play very little role in your completion of medical school and your eventual role as a practioner of the healing arts. If you think the lack of internet service is frustrating, wait until you have the responsibility for someone's care and despite your best efforts and the best efforts of your colleagues, they are not doing well. That is the ultimate frustration you will encounter in the career you wish to enter as a practioner. My advice, although not requested, is to study, study and study. That is the only thing which will get you through medical school and beyond. Believe me, it gets more gratifying after medical school, but, not necessarily easier. So, try to adjust to the inconveniences of the electronic snafu's and concentrate on your studies and meeting supportive, positive people to share your new journey.
Sincerely,
IMG DOC
P.S. When I walked to school, it was uphill, both ways.

[MD999]

Dear Columbiatech,
Ski Doc 42 is on the mark, albeit somewhat harsh. I have attempted to counsel this young student in the finer points of political correctness and see I have more work to do. (Humor). When I was attending Medical School in the Caribbean (late '70's), the concerns were drinking water, electricity to study, water to bath and whether the Prof. was going to show in class to teach. The finer points of the internet and Vonage did not exist at that time. Getting adjusted to a new environment is never easy and desiring the security of being able to communicate with one's support system (at a reasonable price) is understood. Having monitored the boards lately, it is obvious that the Administration is having problems with the electronics service they wish their students to have. The best I can tell, the admin. has been "up front" with the problem and the students will eventually have what they want. Notice I didn't say, what the NEED.
The internet will play very little role in your completion of medical school and your eventual role as a practioner of the healing arts. If you think the lack of internet service is frustrating, wait until you have the responsibility for someone's care and despite your best efforts and the best efforts of your colleagues, they are not doing well. That is the ultimate frustration you will encounter in the career you wish to enter as a practioner. My advice, although not requested, is to study, study and study. That is the only thing which will get you through medical school and beyond. Believe me, it gets more gratifying after medical school, but, not necessarily easier. So, try to adjust to the inconveniences of the electronic snafu's and concentrate on your studies and meeting supportive, positive people to share your new journey.
Sincerely,
IMG DOC
P.S. When I walked to school, it was uphill, both ways.

I will side with columbiadoc on this one.

All because some people "toughed it out" back when they went to medical school or thought that they worked harder, it doesnt give them the right to criticize somebody who wants to be contacted by their family. It can be for a number of reasons that we dont know, maybe encouragment, support, a study break, who knows.
When you sign a lease on a piece of property and for services, you expect the other end of the deal to hold up their promises right? Internet was on that lease, so they have every right to want what theyre paying for.

What works for some people doesnt work for others. It's their business and we shouldnt be the judge of whether its right or wrong.

I do think it is shady though that the internet isnt up still at part of the RH. Internet can be used to do a number of things, for leisure purposes, communications, handling business that needs to be taken care of, studying purposes...

I think its vital to have that up and going.

Also what we have to keep in mind that, for a lot of families out there, 25cents/minute to call someone is a lot of money. Even if the person recieving the call is not charged for an incoming call, the family placing it is charged 25cents/min. The Vonage would be perfect to help solve that problem, because no matter what end of the call makes the call, its still charging somebody a lot of money for that call. Vonage would solve that problem.

I dont think people who criticize that have a right to do so. Who knows, the Columbiatech person might just be studying his/her butt off 24/7 and will be #1 in the class, but wants to talk to family for encouragement or support.... we dont know but we have to respect that.

I think you guys are getting really shorted by still not having a functioning Internet. You guys gotta bug Sebastien or SMU Florida to get that done if neccessary.

IMG Doc, back when you went to medical school you had no choice but to "tough it out" according to your standards. Anybody who wants to "tough it out" according to your standards should go to a way less developed island (but still it wouldnt really be comparable because they all have internet nowadays). Point being, times have changed, communications to some students is integral to their studies. If that helps the student study better as stress relief (rather than getting trashed and partying every weekend like a number students do), then go for it. Thats what it comes down to in the long run, your study habits (and stress reliefs) when prepping for Step 1.

[AmericanIMG]

i can't believe the complaining about the internet. The IT guy, SD, works his tail off to make sure everything is up and running, and to insinuate that he and the school have ulterior motives to keep ppl form using Vonage is flat out ridiculous.

i was the first student to use Vonage at the Res hall, and it will work fine. what is not being recognized is that there are nearly double the amount of students in the res hall as compared to previous semesters ; this is because the school tried to help accomodate as many students as possible with the price of living being so high in the Caymans. As a result of this high number of students, SD and SMU have been working on rewiring and reinstalling the internet system in the dorms, in order to increase the amount of total bandwidth available to students. when everything is said and done, the internet will be much better then in previous semesters.

in reply to the previous statement that the internet was working then came down, in the beginning it was working great. with all the students coming in, and some using massive amounts of bandwidth (downloading/filesharing/vonage), the network went down, but SD and SMU have been putting in quite a bit of work to get the new system up and running ASAP. to help with bandwidth issues, those students using Vonage should go to their settings and turn on the bandwidth saver!!! if you do not Vonage uses somethign like 75 or 100 kb/s ; the bandwidth saver drops it to about 30 kb/s with minimal drop in sound quality. if the students at the res hall use this option it will help quite a bit.

the IT ppl at SMU are working their tail off, and the students should be appreciative of all their efforts. though it is frustrating there are many things that students can do to help out with the problem.
1 - use the library at school to DL the lecture powerpoints.
- most of the hard lines in the library are up and running. bring a ethernet cable to the library, plug it in, and access the share folder as you normally would. the hard line is so fast that a lecture that was taking me to DL wirelessly in 10mins came in about...15 seconds.
2 - disable your file sharing, and dont use it in the dorms until the new system is up and running. there used to be a system in place where all the file sharing progs were disabled in the dorms, but i think SD took it down for previous semesters students as a favor.
3 - disable webcams and other things that suck up bandwidth.
4 - have some patience!!!

:wink:

[eastcoastchic]

If you order a soft line for your laptop then you can use the Vonage anywhere there's internet with a headset. It works really well and that's how I was functioning for the first few days I was here.

[MD999]

i can't believe the complaining about the internet. The IT guy, SD, works his tail off to make sure everything is up and running, and to insinuate that he and the school have ulterior motives to keep ppl form using Vonage is flat out ridiculous.

i was the first student to use Vonage at the Res hall, and it will work fine. what is not being recognized is that there are nearly double the amount of students in the res hall as compared to previous semesters ; this is because the school tried to help accomodate as many students as possible with the price of living being so high in the Caymans. As a result of this high number of students, SD and SMU have been working on rewiring and reinstalling the internet system in the dorms, in order to increase the amount of total bandwidth available to students. when everything is said and done, the internet will be much better then in previous semesters.

in reply to the previous statement that the internet was working then came down, in the beginning it was working great. with all the students coming in, and some using massive amounts of bandwidth (downloading/filesharing/vonage), the network went down, but SD and SMU have been putting in quite a bit of work to get the new system up and running ASAP. to help with bandwidth issues, those students using Vonage should go to their settings and turn on the bandwidth saver!!! if you do not Vonage uses somethign like 75 or 100 kb/s ; the bandwidth saver drops it to about 30 kb/s with minimal drop in sound quality. if the students at the res hall use this option it will help quite a bit.

the IT ppl at SMU are working their tail off, and the students should be appreciative of all their efforts. though it is frustrating there are many things that students can do to help out with the problem.
1 - use the library at school to DL the lecture powerpoints.
- most of the hard lines in the library are up and running. bring a ethernet cable to the library, plug it in, and access the share folder as you normally would. the hard line is so fast that a lecture that was taking me to DL wirelessly in 10mins came in about...15 seconds.
2 - disable your file sharing, and dont use it in the dorms until the new system is up and running. there used to be a system in place where all the file sharing progs were disabled in the dorms, but i think SD took it down for previous semesters students as a favor.
3 - disable webcams and other things that suck up bandwidth.
4 - have some patience!!!

:wink:

Nobody said that they werent working hard at getting it up and running. People arent satisfied that its still not up, and just that fact that we're heading into week 3 now. I think you missed the point that the poster was trying to make. People are unhappy, they ask whats going on, they get a round-around answer. Students at the RH should demand to be pro-rated, and reimbursed for this unacceptable amount of time with no internet as that is a break of the lease by SMU RH. Maybe then will they really get things done in a realistic manner.

There's a little over 100 rooms in the RH. There's hundreds of rooms at the marriott or other hotels. Im sure theyre internet isnt down for 3 weeks at a time. Why not hire a company that would provide quality services for SMU's students as other places do for their hotel guests? All the money that goes into SMU im sure they can dish it out.


Obviously youre online and not complaining. You post quite frequently and Im pretty sure that if you didnt have internet for an extended period of time you'd be more than pissed too. So you gotta put yourself in their shoes to get what theyre trying to say.

[AmericanIMG]

the point of the first post was frustration and insinuation that the res hall doesnt want ppl to have vonage. read it again in case you missed that one.

its been a frustrating experience i am sure to all in the res hall, but its not like the school isnt doing the best they can to get it up and running. as far as the marriot or wherver having 100 rooms...how many ppl do u think in the marriott are DLing notes or software or media or using vonage!?!? did you not read what i posted previously? the reason the internet is down is because too many ppl were doing way too much, and the system wasnt meant to handle so many DLs/ppl using Vonage, etc. before you post please read more carefully previous posts.

as far as a round-round answer (which i think you mean they are getting the runaround???) the people they should talk to are SG and SD. the res hall can do several thigns to alleviate the problem, such as ban peer2peer like they did previously, and ban VoIP (like vonage). they arent doing these things, instead they are trying to fix the internet so all students can use what they choose withour crashing the network or slowing it to a crawl.

these are all issues to bring up to your res hall council, and complaining on a random board isnt going to help. also, no matter how upset and frustrated res hall students are getting, the IT ppl are working their tails off trying to get everything back up and running. again, there are alternatives to the situation, such as the library to get notes etc etc.

:wink:

[MD999]

the point of the first post was frustration and insinuation that the res hall doesnt want ppl to have vonage. read it again in case you missed that one.

its been a frustrating experience i am sure to all in the res hall, but its not like the school isnt doing the best they can to get it up and running. as far as the marriot or wherver having 100 rooms...how many ppl do u think in the marriott are DLing notes or software or media or using vonage!?!? did you not read what i posted previously? the reason the internet is down is because too many ppl were doing way too much, and the system wasnt meant to handle so many DLs/ppl using Vonage, etc. before you post please read more carefully previous posts.

as far as a round-round answer (which i think you mean they are getting the runaround???) the people they should talk to are SG and SD. the res hall can do several thigns to alleviate the problem, such as ban peer2peer like they did previously, and ban VoIP (like vonage). they arent doing these things, instead they are trying to fix the internet so all students can use what they choose withour crashing the network or slowing it to a crawl.

these are all issues to bring up to your res hall council, and complaining on a random board isnt going to help. also, no matter how upset and frustrated res hall students are getting, the IT ppl are working their tails off trying to get everything back up and running. again, there are alternatives to the situation, such as the library to get notes etc etc.

:wink:

Definition of what RH administration is doing:

(AmericanIMG, try looking up definitions before your attempt at correcting everyday words used in the English language):
RUN-AROUND: Deception, usually in the form of evasive excuses.

From Dictionary.com (couldnt find one for your "round-round" word...even tried the slang dictionary with no luck :( )

Also at the Marriott and other hotels, Im sure there's way more activity going on with the Internet services and they still withstand common things like downloading and file-sharing. So that excuse doesnt fly.

Also this "random board" on the internet forum, which only a select few of SMU Cayman students apparently have access to (cuz their internets work), isnt a random board. We have postings here by the Vice President of SMU, Dean of Student Affairs, and other school officials. Action gets done when things are posted on this "random board". Potential students come here for info about the school so its in SMU's best interest to participate in this "random board".

This issue can be brought up before the "RH-council", but why (besides the fact that it'll just prolong the whole drama)? It's well-known what the problem is. It's NOT vonage usage, its about "fixing" the internet on the cheap. Flat out, thats what it is. You can try to say what you want, but there's no denying that.
Cayman's not a third world country where that kinda stuff goes on. It's infrastructure is comparible or even better to many US states so they HAVE the technology to solve the problem, and yes it is a big problem, and the only thing holding back is that the money is not being spent to fix it.

Back when I was in Cayman they had the movie-share folder going on. Almost ALL students were downloading movies from there ALL THE TIME and it pretty much withstood the downloading. It might have went off for a few minutes a day at times but other than that it all was fine.

Since they canceled that movie-sharefolder which was a huge bandwidth hog, that would free up enough bandwidth to handle voip programs like Vonage, which not all students use.

There are number of things that can be done:
Preferably, pay the money to have a decent running internet wiring or whatever it is in place.

Reimburse students for this unacceptable downtime (RH contract basically says internet is part of the package so it IS being pre-paid for).

Install WORKING telephone lines in the RH (kinda how the RH contract says there are-which is a lie, just like the "jacuzzi" that's not there as well).

People who dont live in the dorms are either the ones complaining and trying to defend SMU RH students rights (such as myself), or are coming up with RUN-AROUND excuses to legitimate concerns that they are in no position to address.

[Nimmuk]

Solution: Go and live at the Marriot

Also, I am pretty sure the school can get this done faster, however, they are trying to accommodate student needs: Solution- block Vonage.

[LDMD2B]

Well everyone should keep in mind that SB told us the way to go about calling the states would be to get voip. I must say SMU should get their act together and fix the problem. Two weeks now our internet has been on and off on and off, more off then on. You can't download a lecture, email teachers or do anything without it in the middle going off. Then you have to wait till the next day for it to come back on for a few hours then it goes back out. Whatever the problem is, there has to be a way to fix it, and blocking voip is not the answer. :? :evil:

[AmericanIMG]

Definition of what RH administration is doing:

(AmericanIMG, try looking up definitions before your attempt at correcting everyday words used in the English language):
RUN-AROUND: Deception, usually in the form of evasive excuses.

From Dictionary.com (couldnt find one for your "round-round" word...even tried the slang dictionary with no luck :( )

Also at the Marriott and other hotels, Im sure there's way more activity going on with the Internet services and they still withstand common things like downloading and file-sharing. So that excuse doesnt fly.

Also this "random board" on the internet forum, which only a select few of SMU Cayman students apparently have access to (cuz their internets work), isnt a random board. We have postings here by the Vice President of SMU, Dean of Student Affairs, and other school officials. Action gets done when things are posted on this "random board". Potential students come here for info about the school so its in SMU's best interest to participate in this "random board".

This issue can be brought up before the "RH-council", but why (besides the fact that it'll just prolong the whole drama)? It's well-known what the problem is. It's NOT vonage usage, its about "fixing" the internet on the cheap. Flat out, thats what it is. You can try to say what you want, but there's no denying that.
Cayman's not a third world country where that kinda stuff goes on. It's infrastructure is comparible or even better to many US states so they HAVE the technology to solve the problem, and yes it is a big problem, and the only thing holding back is that the money is not being spent to fix it.

Back when I was in Cayman they had the movie-share folder going on. Almost ALL students were downloading movies from there ALL THE TIME and it pretty much withstood the downloading. It might have went off for a few minutes a day at times but other than that it all was fine.

Since they canceled that movie-sharefolder which was a huge bandwidth hog, that would free up enough bandwidth to handle voip programs like Vonage, which not all students use.

There are number of things that can be done:
Preferably, pay the money to have a decent running internet wiring or whatever it is in place.

Reimburse students for this unacceptable downtime (RH contract basically says internet is part of the package so it IS being pre-paid for).

Install WORKING telephone lines in the RH (kinda how the RH contract says there are-which is a lie, just like the "jacuzzi" that's not there as well).

People who dont live in the dorms are either the ones complaining and trying to defend SMU RH students rights (such as myself), or are coming up with RUN-AROUND excuses to legitimate concerns that they are in no position to address.

1 - if you actually stopped and read the above post, you would see i was talking about the previous posters use of round-round, and using the real term run-around. please READ before you mouth off and embarass yourself in front of everyone.

2 - res hall council is the way that students in the Res Hall are supposed to give complaints to the administration

3 - this is a random board, because students can pick up the phone and call to make changes, or talk to their res hall council rep (whom the students voted for in the first place)

4 - whenever u lived in the res hall, people may have used the movie folder or peer2peer, but obviously you have no idea the current situation in the dorms

5 - have u been to the island since the hurricane? everything is slowly getting back in order, and to even get someone to come out to take a look at internet takes 3-4 weeks...way more then in the US. unless you know someone, it definitely isnt happening. maybe you should look more into Cayman before mouthing off???

wow, you post and ramble on and on, but obviously have no idea what the issue is. maybe when you were in Cayman things were different, but things are now as they are, and students need to adjust while the school fixes things.

if there are any other complaints, please talk to your SGA rep, or talk to me. i am an SGA rep here at SMU.

:wink:

[MD999]

Definition of what RH administration is doing:

(AmericanIMG, try looking up definitions before your attempt at correcting everyday words used in the English language):
RUN-AROUND: Deception, usually in the form of evasive excuses.

From Dictionary.com (couldnt find one for your "round-round" word...even tried the slang dictionary with no luck :( )

Also at the Marriott and other hotels, Im sure there's way more activity going on with the Internet services and they still withstand common things like downloading and file-sharing. So that excuse doesnt fly.

Also this "random board" on the internet forum, which only a select few of SMU Cayman students apparently have access to (cuz their internets work), isnt a random board. We have postings here by the Vice President of SMU, Dean of Student Affairs, and other school officials. Action gets done when things are posted on this "random board". Potential students come here for info about the school so its in SMU's best interest to participate in this "random board".

This issue can be brought up before the "RH-council", but why (besides the fact that it'll just prolong the whole drama)? It's well-known what the problem is. It's NOT vonage usage, its about "fixing" the internet on the cheap. Flat out, thats what it is. You can try to say what you want, but there's no denying that.
Cayman's not a third world country where that kinda stuff goes on. It's infrastructure is comparible or even better to many US states so they HAVE the technology to solve the problem, and yes it is a big problem, and the only thing holding back is that the money is not being spent to fix it.

Back when I was in Cayman they had the movie-share folder going on. Almost ALL students were downloading movies from there ALL THE TIME and it pretty much withstood the downloading. It might have went off for a few minutes a day at times but other than that it all was fine.

Since they canceled that movie-sharefolder which was a huge bandwidth hog, that would free up enough bandwidth to handle voip programs like Vonage, which not all students use.

There are number of things that can be done:
Preferably, pay the money to have a decent running internet wiring or whatever it is in place.

Reimburse students for this unacceptable downtime (RH contract basically says internet is part of the package so it IS being pre-paid for).

Install WORKING telephone lines in the RH (kinda how the RH contract says there are-which is a lie, just like the "jacuzzi" that's not there as well).

People who dont live in the dorms are either the ones complaining and trying to defend SMU RH students rights (such as myself), or are coming up with RUN-AROUND excuses to legitimate concerns that they are in no position to address.

1 - if you actually stopped and read the above post, you would see i was talking about the previous posters use of round-round, and using the real term run-around. please READ before you mouth off and embarass yourself in front of everyone.

2 - res hall council is the way that students in the Res Hall are supposed to give complaints to the administration

3 - this is a random board, because students can pick up the phone and call to make changes, or talk to their res hall council rep (whom the students voted for in the first place)

4 - whenever u lived in the res hall, people may have used the movie folder or peer2peer, but obviously you have no idea the current situation in the dorms

5 - have u been to the island since the hurricane? everything is slowly getting back in order, and to even get someone to come out to take a look at internet takes 3-4 weeks...way more then in the US. unless you know someone, it definitely isnt happening. maybe you should look more into Cayman before mouthing off???

wow, you post and ramble on and on, but obviously have no idea what the issue is. maybe when you were in Cayman things were different, but things are now as they are, and students need to adjust while the school fixes things.

if there are any other complaints, please talk to your SGA rep, or talk to me. i am an SGA rep here at SMU.

:wink:

First off, you should make your posts more clear, as they dont make any sense as to what youre saying or who youre talking to.

2ndly yes i have been to GC since Ivan, and also smart enough to leave before it hit, did u?

3rd- Students can pick up the phone and talk to somebody to make changes?? Wow, really? What world are you living in? That NEVER happened before, and dont try to say it does. Posting on this "random board" that you spend much of your free time doing ( I hope its free time from studying at least-having so many posts- hope it never effected any of your courses along the way), posting on this random board gets things done when the "phone" trick doesnt work (which is like 99% of the time).

4th I see the reason why youre trying to act like Mr SMU thats cause youre SGA rep which isnt a title to brag about. Here in Maine they had no one running for SGA so they pleaded for 2 people from each class to want to be part of SGA. Thats because unfortunately they were very ineffective during my previous 4 semesters and I dont see that changing, so sorry for breaking that to you. I personally think SGA reps should consist of students whose academic profile can tolerate the extra activities, I would hate to see a student get so caught up in trying to kiss school faculty members rear-ends all the time that they forget to truly represent the needs of the student body, let alone not getting by courses. Thats another discussion (kinda old school about what a hard-working student is made of).
The way you seem to be, youre either an all-honor student who's never dropped/failed or repeated courses on a regular basis, or a poser who is trying to use self-proclaimed clout to act as a med school guru when your last few posts cant make sense for the life of me. Which one are you?? You prob wont say, so it doesnt matter.
Either way, if you cant acknowledge the needs of your fellow students and address them in a manner that it should be addressed in, I suggest you withdraw from SGA as it will be detrimental to your studies and a waste of yours and your fellow classmates times.

Stop trying to defend the RUN-AROUND excuses given by SMU RH and try defending the students who voted for you. Thats what your supposed to do while relentlessly shooting for that pass in your classes and ultimately USMLE Step 1. Thats what it all comes down to, where as my constant Honors of courses wouldnt mean a thing without that (hopefully) 260/99 USMLE score next to my name :lol:

Best of luck, study hard, and God Bless.

[MedSter]

Definition of what RH administration is doing:

(AmericanIMG, try looking up definitions before your attempt at correcting everyday words used in the English language):
RUN-AROUND: Deception, usually in the form of evasive excuses.

From Dictionary.com (couldnt find one for your "round-round" word...even tried the slang dictionary with no luck :( )

Also at the Marriott and other hotels, Im sure there's way more activity going on with the Internet services and they still withstand common things like downloading and file-sharing. So that excuse doesnt fly.

Also this "random board" on the internet forum, which only a select few of SMU Cayman students apparently have access to (cuz their internets work), isnt a random board. We have postings here by the Vice President of SMU, Dean of Student Affairs, and other school officials. Action gets done when things are posted on this "random board". Potential students come here for info about the school so its in SMU's best interest to participate in this "random board".

This issue can be brought up before the "RH-council", but why (besides the fact that it'll just prolong the whole drama)? It's well-known what the problem is. It's NOT vonage usage, its about "fixing" the internet on the cheap. Flat out, thats what it is. You can try to say what you want, but there's no denying that.
Cayman's not a third world country where that kinda stuff goes on. It's infrastructure is comparible or even better to many US states so they HAVE the technology to solve the problem, and yes it is a big problem, and the only thing holding back is that the money is not being spent to fix it.

Back when I was in Cayman they had the movie-share folder going on. Almost ALL students were downloading movies from there ALL THE TIME and it pretty much withstood the downloading. It might have went off for a few minutes a day at times but other than that it all was fine.

Since they canceled that movie-sharefolder which was a huge bandwidth hog, that would free up enough bandwidth to handle voip programs like Vonage, which not all students use.

There are number of things that can be done:
Preferably, pay the money to have a decent running internet wiring or whatever it is in place.

Reimburse students for this unacceptable downtime (RH contract basically says internet is part of the package so it IS being pre-paid for).

Install WORKING telephone lines in the RH (kinda how the RH contract says there are-which is a lie, just like the "jacuzzi" that's not there as well).

People who dont live in the dorms are either the ones complaining and trying to defend SMU RH students rights (such as myself), or are coming up with RUN-AROUND excuses to legitimate concerns that they are in no position to address.

1 - if you actually stopped and read the above post, you would see i was talking about the previous posters use of round-round, and using the real term run-around. please READ before you mouth off and embarass yourself in front of everyone.

2 - res hall council is the way that students in the Res Hall are supposed to give complaints to the administration

3 - this is a random board, because students can pick up the phone and call to make changes, or talk to their res hall council rep (whom the students voted for in the first place)

4 - whenever u lived in the res hall, people may have used the movie folder or peer2peer, but obviously you have no idea the current situation in the dorms

5 - have u been to the island since the hurricane? everything is slowly getting back in order, and to even get someone to come out to take a look at internet takes 3-4 weeks...way more then in the US. unless you know someone, it definitely isnt happening. maybe you should look more into Cayman before mouthing off???

wow, you post and ramble on and on, but obviously have no idea what the issue is. maybe when you were in Cayman things were different, but things are now as they are, and students need to adjust while the school fixes things.

if there are any other complaints, please talk to your SGA rep, or talk to me. i am an SGA rep here at SMU.

:wink:


Found that part way too funny, lol. I can imagine it now, "Hi yeah, Dr. G, I'm fed up with the way this and that is being done, ok?"
Dr G response, "Well, thanks for calling, problem solved!"

Would be nice, but sadly, not true.

Side note: AmericanIMG and other medical students, in becoming a successful physician you have to master the art of professionalism. We carry that on the way we act and present ourselves to our patients and to the general population. I advise you to keep this in mind.
The language that we use towards our patients and our peers can be very indicative of who we are. So try to avoid the un-professional approach, it really does appear very unintelligent, immature, childish and kinda "ghetto-doc"-ish.
The use of language in your post AmericanIMG makes me want to urgently suggest to you to study the "Hi-Yields" of professional conduct, it appears that youre lacking quite heavily in that field. Don't mean to put you on that spot, but you definantly have to check that attitude (it wont be tolerated in your clinicals as well as basic sciences).

[IMG DOC]

Dear md999,
You have gone from defending a students right to have his lease honored and his ability to call home at a reasonable rate, to attacking a student who is frustrated with the cont. discontent exhibited on this board.His discontent stems from continued complaints about a situation that he feels cannot be fixed as quickly as others want it to be. He and other students have given suggestions about accomplishing needed computer tasks at other locations and/or limiting bandwith. If, as you say, this is the only way to get things accomplished, I have no way to know for sure. From an outsiders prospective, it appears that the Administration of St. Matthews is as straight forward as they come. Having attended 2 schools (UCE and AUC), I recall that the student came to study and have a certain level of frustration and the Administration came to Administrate. I don't know what the students want (and I really don't want to know), but, it appears that the students have a good environment to learn medicine. Your last post covered many of the frustrations you had with the school and if they are able to be achieved, maybe someone will notice. Best of luck to both of you in your future careers.
Sincerely,
IMG DOC.

[AmericanIMG]

ahh man,
this thread fell apart...i thought the boards were made to offer advice, not for people to call people "ghettoish"??? what a joke.

to recap
1 - the internet is down, the school is working on it, in the meantime the library and school wireless is still up and running (the hard lines in the library are much faster then the wireless)
2 - the res hall is having various problems because of the large amounts of students.
3 - the main reasons that the internet is having so many prbs at the res hall is
1) too little bandwidth
2) too many students trying to activate vonage/DL things/run peer2peer

hope that was clear enough :wink:

again, for problems in the res hall, please talk to your res hall council. thats their job.

not going to bother responding to foolish posts anymore, i only post on here to help students out.

:wink:

[lacarthic]

I talked to S.D. (who was working over the weekend to get the internet going) and he said that it should be sorted out by today or tomm. The reason is too little bandwith and not enough routers.

[SMU_Information]

I was unaware of this issue, but I will pass it along. We appreciate everyone's patience.

[skidoc42]

I talked to S.D. (who was working over the weekend to get the internet going) and he said that it should be sorted out by today or tomm. The reason is too little bandwith and not enough routers.

All very true.

skidoc42

[Knight007]

I'm not in SMU (yet)...but I follow this forum and I noticed that school officials regularly post on this forum and it seems they like feedback from their students... SMU seems very different from other schools because they actually listen to their students
This (temporary) bandwidth issue will seem trivial if I post all the horror stories students experienced while living at the dorms or apartments of the other big carib schools. I'm quite sure they will have it fixed soon since they keep posting updates of the situation.

[lacarthic]

I'm not in SMU (yet)...but I follow this forum and I noticed that school officials regularly post on this forum and it seems they like feedback from their students... SMU seems very different from other schools because they actually listen to their students.

That is one of the reasons I chose SMU over SGU, AUC and ROSS

[Sebastien Guilbard]

Ok, I know everyone is very upset about the RH internet.
The too little bandwith is not the issue. We got 2,5/1mg plus a E1 at 2meg/2meg in the RH.
Just for info, The campus is running out of two E1 for over 430 students, plus faculties and staff.....
We are trying to locate the hardware problems, since the bandwith is not the issue. Is it going to happen overnight, I wish but doubt it.
That's all I can tell you, everyone at the RH and S.D are working on this problem as fast as they can.
May I add that Internet is just not an exact science, and it will go down, either you live in the U.S and use any providers there, or in the caribbeans.
Thank you for keeping up with this situation.

[Sebastien Guilbard]

Sorry I forgot:
For the one who insinuates that the RH has internet down so SMU can get money out of Digicell, well what can I say, except that SMU does not have share in Digicell, and I was just trying to make your life easier by having them around.
If you did not know, the incoming calls are free on your phone, and calling cards in the US will be less than 3cts/mn to call the caribbeans.
I know, this is probably a not good enough solution for you though......

[DUtrainertom]

Digicel was the worst experience ever. They give you decent rates, but their service staff stunk, and their customer support staff (when I was on the island) was located on Jamaica. I would not recommend Digicel to anyone.

Also, calling cards from the USA to Grand Cayman (Cellular- what SG is recommending) are NOT $0.03 a minute, they are about $0.15 per minute. http://www.callingcards.com/shopping/rate_table1.asp?GUID=FBC43463A2813147A29983CD75986 A5E

That does not include surcharges etc that they surely will charge.

Lastly, the internet problems were abundant in the RH before Ivan. Lets hope that they finally get fixed.

[PersianPrescription]

S.G. thank you for having the bank and digicel come to RH. It made our lives easier. Although digicel didn't work for me because it's impossible to get calls from U.S. or use callback service most of the time.

I know everybody is working hard but I just wish the whole thing would be fixed. Some of us subscribe to online books for our master's classes and it's sort of impossible to read the assigned chapters without internet.

For those looking for calling cards, I use www.cards4students.com They're a bit more expensive but they always work, there is no connection fee and I don't think they round up to the next minute. 20 cents a min. from cayman to U.S. or the other way around.

[lionking]

Today the net was up and now it is down and the IT guy said that Vonage will be blocked.... I don't expect much but I would appreciate stable internet so I can talk to the outside world and AC in the classroom... Is that too much to ask for?

[Sebastien Guilbard]

Hello,

No it is not too much to ask for.
We have changed systems, add bandwith but it still was not stable. This was just not normal....and we know why now!!!
S.D did a scan and there is one student who plugged in a wireless device, enabled DHCP and created an IP conflict on RH system. We got the mac address, it is just question of few more monitoring to find out who the student is. After this, S.D feels pretty confident that the Internet will be stable.
I can post the name of the student so you can go and talk to him about disrupting the RH internet (just kidding) :wink:
This is why I had asked all of you not to plug in devices (wireless access points, vonages, etc...) withouth registering them with S.D
The new problem we face is, since we changed the system, we will need to work on authorizing the vonage phone through the new server. S.D will be working on it, but for the moment, he does not know if this device will allow it.

[smustudent2]

Thanks Sebastien for letting us know about this.

[charlottenian]

Hello,

No it is not too much to ask for.
We have changed systems, add bandwith but it still was not stable. This was just not normal....and we know why now!!!
S.D did a scan and there is one student who plugged in a wireless device, enabled DHCP and created an IP conflict on RH system. We got the mac address, it is just question of few more monitoring to find out who the student is. After this, S.D feels pretty confident that the Internet will be stable.
I can post the name of the student so you can go and talk to him about disrupting the RH internet (just kidding) :wink:
This is why I had asked all of you not to plug in devices (wireless access points, vonages, etc...) withouth registering them with S.D
The new problem we face is, since we changed the system, we will need to work on authorizing the vonage phone through the new server. S.D will be working on it, but for the moment, he does not know if this device will allow it.

thanks sebastian for working on the net