New Online Directory LSP Announcment

sent on January 20, 2005

Penn's Online Directory is scheduled to be upgraded at the end of this month.  The new Directory promises to balance the business needs of the University with the privacy needs of faculty, staff, and students. Below is an overview of who is affected, what is changing, when the changes will take effect, and where you can go to learn more about the new Online Directory.

Who's affected?

Changes to how information is displayed and managed in the new Directory will primarily affect any individual with a student, faculty, or staff affiliation at Penn.

What's changing?

1) Who sees what :

New privacy rules will enable a basic set of information to be displayed to all viewers in a Public View.    Faculty and staff can opt to display a full listing including phone numbers and email addresses in the "Public View.”  However, if desired, they may limit what appears in the “public” listing to only name and affiliation (e.g., faculty, staff, or student).   Students are not required to have a minimum listing in either view, consistent with federal privacy law and Penn policy.

A more complete set of information including telephone and email information will be available primarily to students, faculty, and staff via a PennKey-authenticated "Penn View.”  

Aside from the required information, all users will be able to add, delete, and change data in additional fields to provide a user-tailored listing in the Penn View and Public View.

To help familiarize LSPs with the new privacy rules, a complete overview of default, optional, and required information appears in the Privacy Changes Grid at: http://www.upenn.edu/computing/da/penndirectory/helpcenter/privacygrid.html

2) How to be excluded from the new Online Directory :

Many people currently suppressing their profile will no longer need to do so because the new Online Directory will provide users with the ability to limit information shown to the public. Faculty and staff currently suppressing their Directory listing will have the minimum information displayed in the new Directory unless they specifically request exclusion or choose to add information. Faculty and staff with compelling privacy or security concerns may petition the Office of Audit, Compliance, and Privacy to have their Directory listings concealed by contacting privacy@pobox.upenn.edu or 215-573-3348. Students can conceal their listings themselves from within the Directory application.

3) How personal information is updated :

A redesigned online updating utility, available to students, faculty, and staff, will enable users to choose what affiliation and contact information they would like to display from entries fed by University systems such as Penn HR and the Registrar along with personal entries they create.  Users will also be able to see which systems (e.g. Penn HR & Registrar) are providing data to the new Online Directory.

An administrative feature has also been added to allow selected staff members to update entries on behalf of others in their area.  These Directory Liaisons (or proxies) are appointed by School and departmental administration. People wishing to maintain sole responsibility for their Directory information will still have the option to do so. Whenever a Directory Liaison makes a change to a record, an email notification is sent to the person whose record was changed.

4) How "Public View" information is distinguished from "Penn View" information :

Unauthenticated access to the server will yield data that is flagged as "public" data, while authenticated access for authorized users (primarily students, faculty, and staff) will yield a richer data set.  

When are these changes occurring?

Between January 31st & February 6th, students, faculty, and staff will be able to preview how their Public View and Penn View listings appear, via a link from the Penn Web's Directories page. University notification email with instructions will be sent in batches to faculty, staff, and students over the course of several days at the beginning of the preview period. The new Online Directory will be generally available for searching on February 7th.

During the preview period, people will be strongly encouraged to view and edit their information and then select which information they wish to appear in both listings.  Any changes made to an individual's "new" listing will not appear in the current Online Directory. 

How will these changes affect my users?

1) Updating information will be easier:

In addition to being able to create new listing information, users will be able to link to Penn InTouch and U@Penn directly from the new Online Directory to quickly update data fed from the Registrar and Penn HR, respectively.

2) There will be a lag between Directory updates and LDAP updates:

Changes made by users in the new Online Directory will be fed to a new LDAP server being deployed by ISC Networking & Telecommunications via a nightly process.  With this in mind, queries made to the new LDAP server via email clients will not reflect changes made in the new Directory until the next business day. 

3) The new LDAP server will present Public View and Penn View data sets:

The new LDAP server will provide the same information presented in the Public View of the new Online Directory without any email client configuration change.

However, if a user wishes to see the richer set of data available in the Penn View, some email client configuration changes will be needed to facilitate a PennKey-authenticated query of the server.   Configuration instructions for PennKey-authenticated access to the new LDAP server will be made available in the coming weeks.

4) PH and Whois protocols will be retired:

Since the new server will afford a more complete set of contact information via a PennKey authenticated view, PH and Whois lookup capabilities will be retired at the time the new Directory goes live.  For the past several weeks, ISC Networking Services has been sending notices to LSPs listing users of those protocols. Whois acts as the basis for Directory lookups for some host-based email applications like Elm.  Please be aware that this feature will no longer work on those applications once Whois is retired.

Additional information regarding the new LDAP server will be sent via a separate update in the coming weeks.

5) Privacy controls for student Directory information will be relocated:

Prior to the release of the new Directory, students controlled the distribution of Directory information by using "Public" and "Private" radio buttons within Penn InTouch.  Once the preview period for the new Directory begins, students will control the distribution of Directory information by selecting options shown within the Online Directory application.

How do I report problems with the application?

You can report problems with the new Online Directory application to the Provider Desk by writing to prodesk AT isc.upenn.edu , or by calling 3-4017.

Where can I learn more?

You can learn more about the new Online Directory by visiting the following URL:

http://www.upenn.edu/computing/directory/preview.html

By providing a useful set of information for faculty, staff, and students while allowing greater control over the release of personal data, the new Online Directory balances the privacy needs of individuals with the operational needs of the University.  It promises to be a valuable resource for Penn.