SSCC to be Merged into L&S Information Technology Services
In February 2026 the Social Science Computing Cooperative will be merged into the College of Letters and Science Information Technology Services group (L&S ITS). We will continue to provide the same services to the same people as we did under the SSCC, including those outside of L&S.
While there will be almost no changes in our day-to-day operations initially, some things will change in the following months. The L&S ITS Service Desk is currently learning about SSCC’s systems so they can replace the SSCC Help Desk. Endpoint support (i.e. support for laptops and desktops) is being reorganized throughout the College, and Cody Gerhartz and Ryan St. Peters will eventually be transferred to an L&S Departmental Support team that will support all the units we support now, but also some of the nearby units in conjunction with their current support staff.
The SSCC will eliminate two staff positions before this shift takes place, as a result of funding cuts rather than the reorganization (more on that shortly). This will match our operating budget to our current revenue. Nothing can be guaranteed during this time of fiscal uncertainty, but there are no plans for further staff or service cuts. L&S leadership recognizes the importance of the services SSCC provides, especially services with no equivalent on campus like Silo.
Farewell to Reba Schmidt and Caitlin Tefft
We are very sad to say farewell to SSCC staffers Reba Schmidt and Caitlin Tefft. Reba has worked as a Windows System Administrator for the SSCC since 2022, helping to keep the systems you count on running smoothly. Caitlin has been staffing the Help Desk on a part-time, temporary basis for the past year, but also teaching workshops and doing consulting on qualitative analysis for research.
The next article will discuss the impact of Caitlin’s departure on the SSCC Help Desk. The impact of Reba’s departure will be less visible, but with fewer staff managing the same systems there will be less time for innovation, especially on the Windows side. This has some relevance to the later article on Python.
Changes to the SSCC Help Desk
With Caitlin’s departure, Ryan St. Peters will be the sole person staffing the SSCC Help Desk. The hours will remain the same (9-12 and 1-3) and help will continue to be available via email, voice mail, and appointment (in person or by video chat).
Ryan has other duties as well and will frequently be away from room 4218, and completely remote two days/week. You’re welcome to stop by 4226 and see if he’s there, but we recommend making an appointment if you want to meet in person.
This is a temporary situation, as the L&S ITS Service Desk will soon replace the SSCC Help Desk.
ResearchDrive Migrations are in Progress–and Accelerating
We have been working with the ResearchDrive team to make it easier to migrate SSCC project directories to ResearchDrive. One major step is that they have now created ResearchDrive space for all faculty in Economics and Sociology, and we will work with them and with the IT staff of our other members to try to have them create ResearchDrive space for all SSCC-supported faculty outside of SMPH. This means you no longer need to request space before your SSCC project can be migrated. Watch for an email letting you know when your project will be moved.
The next phase will be migrating graduate student projects. Unfortunately, ResearchDrive does not provide space directly to graduate students, so graduate students will need to identify a faculty member who will host their project directory. Be thinking about who this should be.
We recognize that the switch to ResearchDrive is disruptive, especially for graduate students. But the savings are substantial, roughly $150,000 over two years, which is critical in these difficult times.
Changes to Moving Data In and Out of Silo
We’re pleased to announce several changes that make it easier to move data into or out of Silo.
- We’ve eliminated the delay between when files are transferred by Globus and when they are copied to the Silo file system. Files you transfer into Silo using Globus will appear in Silo as soon as the transfer is complete.
- You can move data out of Silo using Globus from any Silo directory, not just designated export folders. Remember, you must not download restricted data to your computer or any other location unless it has been approved to store such data.
- The LinSilo and SlurmSilo servers can now access ResearchDrive space just like Linstat and Slurm (i.e. using rdmount). However, this access is read-only, so you can use it to move data into Silo but not to move it out. See Using ResearchDrive at the SSCC for details. (Note that WinSilo still cannot access ResearchDrive.)
Please send any questions to the SSCC Help Desk.
Serious about Python? Move to Linux
Python is installed on the Winstat servers, and they’re a great place to learn the language. But when you’re ready to do serious work in Python, you’ll want to move to the Linux servers. Linstat is the interactive Linux cluster, and has tools like JupyterLab and VSCode installed and ready to go. Bigger jobs can be submitted to the Slurm cluster.
The Linux servers have much more computing power than even Winstat for Big Jobs: up to 48 cores and 250GB of memory on Linstat, and up to 128 cores and 996GB of memory in Slurm. None of the Winstat servers have GPUs, critical for many machine learning tasks, while some of the Linstats have small T4 GPUs and Slurm has powerful A100 GPUs.
Some Python packages (and a few R and Stata packages) include separate executable programs which are blocked by Winstat. Those must be run on the Linux servers. Setting up conda environments and package management in general just works better in Linux.
Windows 10: The End Is Past!
Microsoft is no longer providing fixes for security problems that are being identified in Windows 10 (unless you enroll in the “Extended Security Updates” program). If you have any personal devices running Windows 10, you need to update to Windows 11. Computers running Windows 10 are officially no longer allowed on the campus network, and are blocked from the SSCC VPN.