Franklin & Marshall College Franklin & Marshall College

ITS Services and Facilities

Filter by Category

Facilities
Hardware Services
Instructional Support
Network Information
Software Services
Tech Enhanced Classrooms
Tech Enhanced Spaces

Filter by Tags

All Tags 58

zDisk: Digital Project Storage

  • June 17, 2011
  • Author: Pradosh Kharel
  • zDisk 1

 What is zDisk?

zDisk is an experimental project exploring network home folders. With network home folders, your home folder and its contents are stored on a file server instead of being stored locally on the computer's hard drive. This gives you easy access to your files from any computer that is connected to the file server.

Here's an example. Alex starts a project - a digital slide show- during a class session on one of the computers in the eLearning Lab (eLL). A few days later, Alex wants to scan some pictures to add to the project, so she stops by the Innovation Zone (IZ) and works on one of the computers in the Digital Media Production Zone. The slide show she saved to her Documents folder on the eLL iMac is available for her to work on in herDocuments folder on the IZ iMac. Later that week, Alex is back in IZ at a different computer adding some short video clips to the presentation. Finally, the following week, Alex is back in the eLL to present the completed presentation to the class. The complete presentation was created using four different computers in two different "zones" in the Harris Center - and the content "followed" Alex to each distinct computer.

How does zDisk work?
It's pretty simple. Log-on to any zDisk-aware computer with your F&M username and password. That's it! zDisk takes care of the technical stuff. Once your project is completed, copy the finished product to eDisk, a flash drive, or burn it to a CD or DVD.

IMPORTANT:
zDisk is not for permanent file storage (see zDisk policies). Any file that has not been modified within the last 30 days will be automatically deleted.

Which computers are zDisk-aware?
zDisk can be accessed from ITS-managed computers the following "zones:"

zDisk computers are connected via gigabit ethernet - a networking technology in which data is transmitted at one gigabit per second - to facilitate fast, high bandwidth data transfer.

Is zDisk different from eDisk?
Yes. zDisk is different from eDisk in several distinct and important ways:

  • zDisk is NOT accessible from any networked computer, but only from computers in distinct "zones" on-campus.
  • zDisk is NOT permanent file storage, but rather supports temporary, semester-long digital media projects that require several days to weeks to complete.
  • zDisk allows you to store more data than eDisk.
  • zDisk supports network home folders allowing easy access to personal projects across different computers.

zDisk was designed and is administered by the Office of Instructional and Emerging Technologies (IET) in Information Technology Services (ITS).

  • zDisk 2

 zDisk Policies:

  • Individuals may not store more than 100 GB of data on zDisk.
  • Any file that has not been modified within 30 days will be deleted.
  • All files will be deleted at the end of each academic semester.
    Fall 2010 semester deletion date: December 31, 2010

Contact:
For more information about zDisk, contact IET.

Tags: zDisk