Policies for Lab Software
Faculty and staff must request what they need before each semester starts. Students must route requests through a faculty or staff member. The cutoff for spring semester software requests is the last day of the Fall semester. The cutoff for Fall semester requests is May 31.
Unless a software package is specifically requested each year, the software package will not be installed – even if it has been installed in the past.
Our goal is to ensure that we do not continue to purchase or install software that will not be used.
We understand that certain special events may require special software or changes to the software configuration already in the labs, once these deadlines are past. If you need special software installed or configured, please allow a minimum of 2 weeks for setup.
Timeline for Software Requests
Software in the Engineering computer labs is installed twice per year, during the summer semester and winter break.
Software requested after the deadline may not be installed by the start of classes in the fall. With 80+ Engineering software packages, many of them inter-operating with one another, ETS needs time to purchase software, and prepare and test our systems to make sure they all work correctly.
April 1: Software request e-mail sent to all college faculty & staff.
May 31: Deadline for faculty to submit software requests
June 7: Deadline for department heads to approve/disapprove software purchase
June 8: ETS begins ordering software. Some purchase orders take up to 6 weeks to resolve.
July 1 – August 1 (5 weeks): Testing phase. ETS begins installing and testing software (as it arrives) for the lab build. After installing, ETS asks requesting professor to test the software. ETS makes adjustments as necessary, then repeat until it works fully.
August 2: Deadline for lab software build to be finalized. No software changes after this date!
Last week of August (typically): Fall semester begins.
First week of December (typically): Fall semester ends. Deadline to request new software for the Spring lab software update.
