Video collection

Video by Miika.

Let's demolish everything!

For taking everything apart we were divided into two groups - morning and afternoon shifts. Dividing were democratically done - first 15 who answered to group chat were the morning shift. We started from Sub Media Center since Main Media Center was still open few hours on Monday. 

It was much faster to dismantle everything than implementing them. Sub Media center took about one hour to take apart. Main Media were almost ready when morning shift went home. So afternoon shift was responsible to taking everything back to school. 

Weird to think the event is really over now.

//Mira

Last days

The electricity issues continued. At some point whole mixed zone were without electricity, which was noticed in the news also. Finally we found the reason behind electricity issues in Main Media Center: The electricians changed the three-phased supply and the distribution box and after it everything worked smoothly.

Few times we needed to reboot our firewalls, otherwise we mainly monitored everything is working smoothly. Of course every morning we tested table groups, wlan and printers before anyone else was there. That way we had time to react if something wasn't working. Fortunately for everyone, everything worked smoothly whole time.

Tomorrow we will start dismantling everything!

//Mira

Second week

One possible reason for power issues? 

Electricity issues have continued. Possible cause: spilled coffee or some faulty user device. On Sunday it seemed the voltage was too high (some places even 360V). I don't know what happened, but after Sunday everything has worked with electricity. 

Monday was quiet day since there weren't any competitions. One fuse has blown again, but it was easy task for electricians. Otherwise IT didn't have any issues whole day which meant chilling. We watched Doctor Who, played and ate well. Luckily we have an awesome team, so we always have something to do. 

Tuesday were also quite quiet. We added some more printers to XDA, fixed basic printer issues and helped with scanning. Everything works smoothly and most important changes are done, so there's no need for IT support. Which is obviously good thing!

//Mira 

Last minute changes

Opening ceremony and first competition days are over. Every day we start by testing table groups, wifi and printers. We also check Zabbix for any alerts. Printers are still the ones causing issues, but luckily they are the easy issues. To ease our job, we added printers from MMC and SMC to Xerox XDA. It helps collecting info about printers and automatically sends reports to support.

We added few more AP's around the area since our network didn't cover all desired areas. Later we decided to change Cisco APs to Arubas. We had tested Arubas earlier and in our experience they work better than Cisco. We will later see how it affects to disappearing AP's.

Some electricity issues have risen and some tables kept losing power both in MMC and SMC. Luckily we have electricians who know what to do. Our duty has been only to contact them and they have checked the issue. Apparently the fuses have been blown and fixing/replacing them fixed the issue.

And in the end - few picture's from the fireworks!

//Mira

Media Centers are open!

Main Media Center opened on Saturday 18th of February, four days before the competition even started. First few days were quite quiet so we had time to finalize all the installations. We installed printers, added wired network to special editing rooms and helped few journalist with minor issues. 

One of the Sub Media Centers (the one we are responsible of) opened on Tuesday 21st of February. Days got little bit busier since more journalist started to arrive. Most common problem had something to with printers. It was the same last year. Usually it means we show how to install drivers for printer and so far the most difficult case has been with faulty color drum cartridge. Which actually took almost two days to replace because of some information issues. 

We also decided to divide our wireless network in two: 5GHz and 2.4GHz. It balanced the workload and wireless started to work much smoothly for everyone. We also decided to manually configure a controller AP, because some of the AP kept disappearing from Zabbix. Configuration fixed the issue and none of the users never even noticed the issue. 

Being in IT can be frustrating because no one ever notices your work if everything is working, but when something doesn't - you are the first one to blame.  

//Mira

Final week before opening

Monday: Free for students!

Tuesday: Installing AP's in the morning and finalizing the plan of newest network group. Later briefing second year students about the topology of MMC and SMC and making sure everyone knows how to use Zabbix and pfSense.

Wednesday: Installing MMC AP's to their correct places, finalizing the documentation and backbone connections. One team building Vierumäki.

Thursday: Installing the table switches to MMC. It really starts to see like we will make it on time.

Friday: Final installation day! MMC Service people had a walk thru the media center and we of course joined them. Our IT team will be working closely with them, so it's important to get known to them.

See you next week!

//Mira

Two weeks summary

The event is closing up fast! Our network were tested in Finlandia Hiihto and of course - it worked perfectly. Only issues were caused by outdated Win7 images which were easily fixed by updating them.

Last week we started building extra network group. It was requested by Datalatu Oy and since we had time, we took it under our wings. In two week we have the basics ready for it and only physical installation left. Unbelievable how fast everything is when people know exactly what to do.

Even cables match the theme color!

We also finished building SMC backbone and Wifi access points are up and running. So basically SMC is only waiting for tables and physical installation of switches and then SMC is fully ready. Unfortunately the situation with MMC is not that good.. We are still not sure which day we get there to do all installations.

This project truly teaches you how to work without knowing everything. It makes this even more exciting.

Oh, and we are finally accredited! Look how awesome the passes are.

//Mira

Volunteers' training

Today we had a training for volunteers in Lahti2017 championships. Over 800 volunteers gathered up to learn the basics about the event and customer service. It feels like half of Finland is somehow part of Lahti2017. And it is awesome.
The event has multiple partners. The biggest is Stora Enso, but there are like 30 other ones also. I didn't even know how many there could be. Full list of the partners can be found here, just scroll down. One of the funniest cooperation so far must be Atria.

Repost @tarjasnowland ・・・ Mitä tänään syötäisiin? Kisamakkaraa! Otan kaksi, tokaisi Topi. Niin sitä pitää poikaseni 💙😀 #lahti2017 #kisamakkara #atria @lahti2017 @atriasuomi #sausages

A photo posted by Lahti2017 (@lahti2017) on Feb 3, 2017 at 7:35am PST

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So what they taught us about customer service? Well, basically it was all about working as a group, always remember to smile and be yourself. The customer service ABC according to Lahti UAS students were:

1. Listen
   Listen the customer. Do not underestimate the customers issue. 
2. Understand.
   Understand the issue. Ask as many questions as needed. If you don't have common language, find someone who can help.
3. Solve the issue.
   Try always resolve the issue right away. If it cannot be solved, make sure the customer knows how to give feedback. 

These three steps equals happy customer!

//Mira

Testing soon!

We have iWeek* going on this week which meant most of the students were taking part of lectures and workshops. It took a toll of students available for today's tasks. Luckily we still managed to do quite much!

We are almost ready with all the configurations, so today we started moving everything to competition area. All of the switches, power plugs, cables, wlan access points and basically everything else were carried in the Main Media Center and Sub Media Center. Now it is time to test them in real life! 

Our systems will be tested in Finlandia Hiihto in the beginning of February. Exciting! 

//Mira

*iWeek program is open for all IT students and the programme is included in the regular program of the specific study groups. 

Guest lectures from partner institutions give lectures and presentations on the following topics:

• GAMING
• VIRTUALIZATION & CLOUD SERVICES
• INTERACTIVE WEB
• INTERNET OF THINGS
• CURIOUS CREATIVES

Program consists of lectures, workshops, networking. You will also learn about the student exchange possibilities in our partner institutions. 

Life is fluid.

Everything changes extremely fast. I should have gotten use to it, but it still sometimes surprises me. We are part of such a big organization. It means that slight change somewhere might mean bigger change for us. It has been interesting to work without exact timetable. It will train all of us for real work, since what I have seen - new things can come up out of nowhere. Life and work is like liquid and you need to be flexible to keep up.

What have changed lately? Well, we got information about mandatory training for all the volunteers. It was a surprise and with such a late notice some have problems to fit it in their schedule. Luckily, we got permission to have few representatives who go for training and then next week shares the info with rest. I am gonna one of the representatives.

And once again - we changed the whole on-call shift system. This time it should be the final version. We will have two persons in Main Media Center (MMC) and two in Sub Media Center (SMC). Second year students will be taking care of that. Third and fourth year students will be available as a technical support and there will always be three of them in the area. Sounds fair, right?

33 days to go!

//Mira

Introducing: New teams

This is getting exciting! Whole autumn we were getting known to all systems and software, preparing ourselves for real work and now it is the time to actually implement all of it.

We have five main teams:

1. Wifi Access Points
2. Network Monitoring System
3. LAN services
4. Cable sets for tables
5. Switches for tables

Well, you can guess the theme of every team. It is kinda obvious. The teams are actually only for building days. It makes sure that every task will be done. Each team have at least five members, even though most have more. Since we have two media centers, Main Media Center and Sub Media Center, every group will eventually split in two. 

Teams have been chosen and everyone is working so hard!

//Mira

ps. I have been away, so it will be a bliss to see everyone next week. Can't wait!

Kick-start for spring semester!

Holidays are over and the whole team is getting ready for real work. Today's classes were mostly about getting orientated. New course information, creating new groups and making sure everyone is on same page about what needs to be done. We decided to add one more tool for keeping track of our progress. Soon we will see how well it actually works.

Most important task for today was creating a timetable for on-call shifts. Main responsibility is for second year students, but 3rd and 4th year students will be around all the time to support them. I have a feeling that most of us will be on stand-by mode somewhere in the area, always ready to step in if needed. That is the beauty of a big group - we will always have enough hands on deck.

48 days to go.

//Mira

Quiet day

Last day of autumn semester. Since this is school project and students need credits, we had morning full of self- and peer evaluations. This autumn we had four different courses included in this project. Each course had different aspect of used technologies and it was delight to realize how many things can be combined into one project.

We had courses about pfsense, Zabbix and naturally the practical course. Courses were designed to support each other and in my opinion, they really did that. It was beautiful.

Now we start enjoying our well-earned holidays. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to everyone! We will continue in the first week of January. Hopefully enthusiastic and rested.

//Mira

ICT Project Expo

Different, but definitely fun day at school. So many different projects! I'm glad that this year every project was presented in fair instead of basic Power Point presentation. It was interesting to test all the applications other ones had made, comment and give feedback. The high light was definitely when I got to test VR glasses for the first time in my life. It was both amazing and scary.

Extempore promotion in #lahtiuas Faculty of Technology ICT Projects-expo. I'm surprisingly good at this. #lahti2017 #promotion #lamk #teku #mikämuumuka #worldchampionships #project #prhommia #edustushommia

A photo posted by Mira Järvenpää (@mirraje) on Dec 8, 2016 at 3:49am PST

With one day notice, our telecommunication team did quite well. I'm proud of my two team members who presented with me without any hesitation. I had made a small Power Point slide show which was on loop. It consisted basic information about our Lahti2017-project and some pictures. Besides the slide show we also had other computer with more detailed pictures and of course - promotion for this blog.

It was truly interesting to talk about this project. Make it more visible to other students. I would do this again any time.

//Mira

Google it.

Things are surely speeding up. This week we finally started putting wireless network together and testing it.

Three of us spent Wednesday evening by trying to figure why pfsense didn't work as it should. Some issues occured... Even installing pfsense was difficult! Luckily we had music. As my usual style - I was dancing around and trying to help the guys, light the room up with my smile. But when pfsense started to give screens like below, we decided it's time to go home.

Our setup on Wednesday evening.

Thursday was also fun. We had the same playlist, but way more people around. One of our teachers were leading the second year students with testing wireless access points. It was amazing to see how he encouraged them to look things up from internet, google things. It's surprising how many issues can be fixed just by googling the solution. You just need to know what to look for. And that is one of the things this school teaches us - how to find relevant information on our own.

IT field is changing fast and the things you learn in school are probably useless when you graduate. It's kinda sad, but there is also potential. School is not supposed to give you direct answers, it's teaching you how to survive later. It took me over 3 years to realized and accept that.

//Mira

Weekly report

Once again it's Thursday which means project day. Planning for MainMediaCenter is on and most of the day went with it. Our proposal wasn't approved as it was, but after some changes we finally came to agreement. Compromising with all parties is the key to success.

After lunch we slit up and started to work with different tasks. This weeks tasks included making changes to pfsense, measuring fibers and getting know to other parts of the area. Besides these tasks, some of us concentrated on documentation and making sure everything is properly written down.

//Mira

Road so far..

There's kinda much to catch up. Like I said earlier, the planning has started long time ago. This autumn we started in August by going through last year's setups. We created a new co-operative workplace for our files and divided everyone in the small groups.

Kuva, jonka Mira Järvenpää (@mirraje) julkaisi 20. 10ta 2016 klo 7.14 PDT

If picture isn't showing, you can check it here.

October just flew by. We tested differences between Cisco and HP switches, made sure they are stable and had little bit fun with configuration. One of the most amusing things in beginning of October was getting our new monitor. You should have seen how everyone was thrilled. Playing with the new toy and messing with music. It's important to have fun while working.

Preparing for #lahti2017. We finally got new monitoring screen, everyone is enjoying it! #studying #project #video #worldchampionship #lamk #mikämuumuka #lahtiuas #teku

Video, jonka Mira Järvenpää (@mirraje) julkaisi 13. 10ta 2016 klo 2.45 PDT

If video isn't showing, you can check it here.

We have made suggestions for network layout of SubMediaCenter and Grandstand Central. Also plans from printers were created. Documenting every plan is surprisingly important thing to do, but luckily at least I like doing it. So far we have at least documents for configurations, printers, VLANs and laptops. I have to say, updating and preparing laptops was bigger operation than anyone thought, but we managed to do it!

//Mira

Welcome!

Lahti2017 is a huge event for Finland and especially for Lahti. This means that students of Lahti University of Applied Sciencies (Lahti UAS) are also deeply involved with it.

Our project is to build IT infrastructure for media and support it in Lahti2017. We support IT team with this import task. You would be surprised how many things are needed for functional, secure internet! This project has started last year's Pre-World Championships and during this autumn our team has been planning and testing, improving things from last year.

How it works?

We have our awesome teachers who make sure the whole package is in one piece. They gently guide us in the right direction and make sure our client's orders are fully heard. They are the bridge between the client and the students. They mainly consult 4th year students and support us when needed.

Every final (4th) year telecommunication student has their own small group of 3rd and 2nd year students. These small groups fulfill different kinds of tasks - whatever is needed. It can be creating topology for cabling or network mapping, clean installing Windows and Linux, or just listing the things we need.

You are most welcome to join us and see little bit behind the scenes.

//Mira