Michael O'Halloran retires from UCC after 43 years of dedicated service.

When Michael O'Halloran began his journey with IT Services at University College Cork (UCC) in 1982, the department was known as the Computer Bureau, the Boole Library was being built, and the world wide web was still seven years away from becoming a reality. Joining as part of the then Technical Advisory Group, Michael played a pivotal role from the outset in helping the UCC community embrace and navigate the emerging digital age. Over the decades, his career would come to mirror the transformation of IT itself - from a single IBM mainframe to a vast digital ecosystem supporting thousands of users across the university.

The Technology-Facilitated Abuse (TFA) Project delivered Ireland’s first digital badge to Recognise and Respond to Technology Facilitated Abuse launched in May 2024. The TFA digital badge is led by women across industry, academia and advocacy, this partnership between UCC, Safe Ireland, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) and other cyber industry experts demonstrated the power of cross-sector collaboration in driving meaningful social impact. To date nearly 120 individuals have completed the TFA digital badge.

Sean O’Mahony works as the Data Centre Services Manager in IT Services. The Data Centre Services Team has responsibility for the backend infrastructure such as storage, virtualisation, disaster recovery and virtual machines that are used to deliver many of UCC's applications and services.

 Marking his 35th year working in UCC, Tomás Tyner retired in November 2024.

Noelle Barry works in IT Services Project Management Office (ITPMO) as the ITPMO Officer. Noelle is also a passionate volunteer for the Greyhound Rescue RIGHT.

In the final episode of 2024, the ITBytes podcast dives into the festive spirit by discussing a variety of topics to help listeners make the most of the Christmas season. 

Elizabeth Hayes works as an IT Systems Administrator in the User Services Group in IT Services. Liz is the technical lead in the rollout of the UCC Services Portal in IT Services and has worked with various units across UCC in the adoption of the Services Portal. Her father, Martin Hayes was the IT Director in UCC, back when it was called the Computer Centre. He retired in 2009 just before she started her undergraduate degree in Computer Science in UCC.

The ITBytes Podcast ran a three-episode series for Cyber Security Month

Our colleague Margaret O’Grady retired from UCC this month. 

Episode 12: Student IT are back, guiding us through start of term in UCC.

David Murphy works as a Data Analyst in Enterprise Solutions Group in IT Services.  David is also a musician and is best known for his work with the pedal steel guitar. David tells us about his career in IT and life as a musician. 

ITBytes podcast chat to UCC gradaute, Rosie O'Byrne, about life on radio and going viral!

IT Services showcase at UCC Good Practice Symposium

Wolfgang Helnwein works as an IT Support Analyst in IT Services.  Wolfgang recounts his academic and professional journey and how the allure of Cork consistently drew him back. Wolfgang’s keen interest for writing, IT, and continuous learning burn brightly, bringing him to where he is today.

The UCC IT Inclusivity Committee have been nominated and shortlisted for the Diversity and Inclusion category in the UCISA 2024 Awards. The Diversity and Inclusion Award seeks to recognise institutions, from across Ireland and the UK, that can demonstrate a holistic and long-term commitment to diversity and inclusion within their university or college. The awards take place on 14^th March in Edinburgh, you can learn more about the awards and the other nominees here.

Sandra Hackett works as a Data Analyst in the Enterprise Solutions Group in IT Services.  Sandra shares her UCC journey, starting as a Computer Science student, completing placement in IT Services to a career in Data and Business Intelligence.

In this two-part episode we chat to Dr Éadaoin Regan and Mairead Roche from the UCC Skills Centre, followed by Marian Twomey from the Digital Advisory Centre (DAC).

UCC Rollout Eduroam WiFi in Crow's Nest Student Accommodation

UCC announces the rollout of Eduroam WiFi to the Crow's Nest Student Accommodation, the latest campus accommodation building to be opened by the university. 

Brian Bugler works in Audio Visual and Media Services as a Senior Audio Visual Designer.  In this article Brian tells us about his career in UCC, becoming a member of the Governing Authority and life outside UCC.

Whether you’re browsing online for the holiday season or just doing routine shopping this December, IT Security have some top cyber security tips that will see you navigating the digital marketplace like a pro! Let’s dive in:

IT Services has a podcast, ITBytes.  Hosted by Noelette Hurley featuring Deirdre Keane and produced by Eoin O’Sullivan.  ITBytes will chat about all things IT in UCC and introduce you to a variety of guests from UCC staff, students, alumni and beyond.  It aims to inform, demystify IT and share some interesting stories with the guests featured on the podcast.

IT Services, in collaboration with HR, have launched a Staff IT guide for new UCC staff.

Ruben works as Videographer and Photographer in Audio Visual & Media Services. Originally from Mexico, Ruben came to Cork in 2020 and studied a MA in Film and Screen Media in UCC. Ruben joined the Audio Visual & Media team in 2022 as student staff and commenced his current intern role in January 2023.  Ruben shares what a typical working day is like for him.

IT Services has recently launched the ITBytes podcast, hosted by Noelette Hurley featuring Deirdre Keane and produced by Eoin O’Sullivan.  ITBytes will chat about all things IT in UCC and introduce you to a variety of guests from UCC staff, students, alumni and beyond.  It aims to inform, demystify IT and share some interesting stories with the guests featured on the podcast.

In conversation with Barry O'Sullivan, Head of IT Operations, UCC.

Barry completed a BComm and an MBS in Business Information Systems in UCC and then worked in PwC for 6 years as a Systems Implementation Engineer working with various clients including Department of Education, CERT, Department Social Welfare, and GPA. Barry then moved to Motorola before moving to Avery Dennison in Cork as an IT Manager. In 2002 Barry joined UCC IT Services working in Enterprise Applications on new systems development and data warehousing projects. One of the first jobs Barry was tasked with was the development of a new system to support anonymous marking – this led to the development and rollout of DMIS that is still widely used today 20 years later! In 2014 Barry became Head of Platform Delivery Group in IT Services with responsibility for the campus networks and datacentres and earlier this year Barry was appointed Head of IT Operations.

IT Services has recently launched the ITBytes podcast, hosted by Noelette Hurley featuring Deirdre Keane and produced by Eoin O’Sullivan.  ITBytes will chat about all things IT in UCC and introduce you to a variety of guests from UCC staff, students, alumni and beyond.  It aims to inform, demystify IT and share some interesting stories with the guests featured on the podcast.

IT Services has recently launched the ITBytes podcast, hosted by Noelette Hurley featuring Deirdre Keane and produced by Eoin O’Sullivan.  ITBytes will chat about all things IT in UCC and introduce you to a variety of guests from UCC staff, students, alumni and beyond.  It aims to inform, demystify IT and share some interesting stories with the guests featured on the podcast.

Introducing ITBytes, IT Services new podcast, hosted by Noelette Hurley featuring Deirdre Keane and produced by Eoin O'Sullivan. Noelette, Deirdre and Eoin work in IT Services. Noelette as an IT Analyst working mostly on web related activities, Deirdre as Communications Coordinator and Eoin as an IT Analyst working within AVMS. ITBytes will cover a variety of topics from navigating the 'wild west' of smart phone explosion in secondary schools in Ireland, to how an interest in printing presses led to creation of Ireland's very first website in UCC.  You can listen to the introduction episode of ITBytes on Spotify and Apple Podcasts

It has been a busy award season for IT Services. Some of our colleagues received their Long Service Award in November and Staff Recognition Awards in December.

Pictured above: IT Services staff at the UCC Staff Recognition Awards. Back left to right: Kilian Murphy, Eugene van den Hurk, Barry Foley and Barry O’Sullivan. Front left to right: Patrick Nagle, Ruth Butler, Sean O’Mahony and Christopher McElligott.

October is Cyber Security month, a global event with the aim of raising awareness of cyber security threats, to promote cyber security among organisations and the general public, and to provide resources to protect themselves online, through education and sharing of good practices.  

In conversation with Rosie Coffey, Head of Enterprise Solutions, IT Services. 

As you will be coming back to the office more, now is the time to think of mobile working. Have a laptop and a desktop in your office? Then you can recycle/repurpose the desktop pc in your office and we will provide you with a *Free Laptop Dock and peripherals instead to use with your existing laptop.

Our Sustainable Future

Remote working tools have demonstrated in the pandemic that there can be an effective alternative to travelling and therefore can help us reduce our carbon footprint. In addition to this overall commitment to helping us live more sustainably, IT Services is also actively making the following contribution to continuing UCC’s progress on sustainability.

As part of the IT Services Mobility Strategy “Stay Mobile! Stay Flexible!” we have been enabling staff to work from anywhere on any device during the pandemic and we want to continue this flexibility while working on campus. We realise there are issues with the WiFi service in some locations, which prompted us to publish a WiFi survey to all staff with the primary goal of identifying areas on campus with poor WiFi coverage. We used the output of this survey to inform an investment in our WiFi infrastructure for the academic year 2021/22.

Tomas joined UCC in 1990 and in that time has transitioned from traditional photography, with film, chemicals/darkroom to a hybrid model of photography when film was scanned, to now a fully digital era using cameras and phones. The one thing that’s a constant in Tomas’s work, is the aim to produce quality imagery that reflects UCC, it’s students and staff. Everything Tomas produces documents UCC for posterity. 

In March 2020 new staff were going to be commencing employment in UCC in a new way due to the pandemic. New staff no longer had access to an onboarding meeting on their first day, they were not going to meet their manager and colleagues in person, and they were not going to be able to physically come to UCC.

A typical day is the life of IT Security Officer Barry Foley.

When Jerry Buckley started working in the then Computer Bureau in 1979, as a trainee Analyst/Programmer, the internet was still a decade away from being born; the Boole Library was being built on the site of the old Quarry, and UCC IT systems ran on one IBM mainframe that that had less power than today’s iPhone.

Status.ucc.ie is a new system that provides information on the availability of the main IT services and applications in UCC.

On the 14^th January 2020 Microsoft will end support for Windows 7

As part of our efforts to improve access to staff online services we are
introducing a new application launcher webpage.

IT Services is pleased to announce our new self-service password reset tool (SSPR) that will enable you to reset your @ucc.ie password anytime, anywhere and from any device.

On foot of the Presidents email, all staff have now moved to a remote working scenario, IT Services want to remind staff that they can still get IT Support in this situation.

Publish is a new, online tool which allows students to quickly and easily create their own personalised academic timetable.

In 2016/17 IT Services undertook a review of IT Policies.   Please familiarise yourself with these policies.  You will find a summary of each policy and a direct link to the policy content here: https://www.ucc.ie/en/it-policies/policies/it-policy/#policy  

New user friendly single logon for many UCC IT Services.  You can now use your UCC email address and password to logon to multiple services making it easier to use them.  You can use it for:-

As part of UCC's Green Campus, IT Services is dedicated to 'greening' its services. The below infographic demonstrates the many ways in which IT Services has achieved this so far.

On November 2, 2015 Google put up a Doodle to celebrate the Bicentenary of George Boole, forefather of the information age. The Doodle linked to the georgeboole.com site that is hosted by UCC.

 Several GDPR phishing scams have been reported to IT Services and detected in the past few days as scammers capitalise on the last-minute rush by companies to ensure compliance ahead of the May 25, 2018 GDPR deadline. Be wary about any GDPR related email requests – they may be a scam or phishing emails.

After 18 months, the design migration project has come to an end. Approximately 350 sites have passed through the process. 

Information Security is now a basic requirement for all businesses to ensure continued operation in a globally connected world.  The human element of Information Security is crucial in digital fraud detection.  The aim of this conference is to help grow awareness on the current risks of cyber fraud across the Cork business community. 

UCC Blackboard including Turnitin will be unavailable during a scheduled maintenance period from Saturday, January 6th, 2018 at 22:00 to Sunday 7th at 15:00 (GMT).

As you are no doubt aware, UCC has been targeted by a number of Phishing attacks in the recent past.  For this reason, we had to increase the detection thresholds this summer which resulted in some legitimate email being tagged as SPAM.  On Monday 17^th October, we are planning to implement a new solution for SPAM email.

During the bank holiday weekend, the Wi-Fi network experienced intermittent downtime.

We apologise for any inconvenience this interruption to the service may have caused.

The Wi-Fi network has now been restored.