Karen Fortoul

This page was current as of December 2006. I am currently switching careers to pursue teaching math to kids.

Hi! I am Sr. IT Manager of the VM System Services Team and the Datacenter Operations Services Team in Operations and Infrastructure Services (OIS) in Informations Services and Technology (formerly Information Systems) here at MIT. VM-SST is responsible for the MITVMA and MITVMC systems running z/VM on the IBM mainframe in W91. Mision critical applications such as Admissions, Payroll and Property run on MITVMA/C. In addition, VM-SST is responsible for LISTSERV, a mailing list service, and Tivoli Storage Manger (TSM) for desktop backups. DOST provides operational support in the W91 Datacenter (a 6500 sq. ft. facility). I am also a member of the Mailman Delivery Team. See archives at: mailman-delivery list on Mailman. There is a also a discussion list for users at: mailman-users list on Mailman.

I joined MIT staff in 1992 as Manager of the Systems Programming Group (SPG, which is now VM-SST) in the Operations and Systems (O&S) department of IS. In 1995, in addition to my SPG role, I did work on the Reengineering TAP project. In 1996, I was leader of MIT's Project Year 2000 Planning and MIT's Y2K Assessment efforts in IS/Discovery and then was on MIT's Year 2000 Team in IS/Delivery. In 2000, after MIT's "uneventful" transition to the Year 2000, I resumed leadership of the VM System Services Team (VM-SST) in the I/T Service Process in Information Systems.

I received my undergraduate degree (S.B.) from MIT in 1982 in Course 6-3, Computer Science and Engineering, from the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. I lived at WILG where I held several positions including Vice President and House Manager. I was on the varsity women's swim team for 4 years, specializing in butterfly and distance freestyle. I was on the club women's water polo team for 4 years. I was a member of the MIT Guild of Bellringers doing change ringing on both tower bells at the Old North Church as well as handbells. (I was also steeple keeper.) After graduating from MIT, I worked as a VM Systems Programmer at the City University of New York/University Computer Center (CUNY/UCC) from 1982-1992. During that time, I played water polo for the Queens College women's water polo club team. I also joined masters swimming and swam for both Red Tide and TNYA.

Useful VM and DOST related links:

DOST doc - weekend coverage, Call List, Co-location Services (public web page), Co-location Servers (old page), Co-location Servers (new page), 3160 Replacement Project W91 Floor Plan, E40 Floor Plan, ... (restricted access)
3down Service Status (Admin restricted)
RT (new) and Casetracker (old) Consultant (auth use only) - Help Desk tools
VM Workshop home page and Tools tape,
IBMVM (was VMESA-L), IBM-MAIN Archives - LISTSERV mailing lists
LSoft's home page - vendor for LISTSERV, here is technical support, LSTSRV-L mail, and LSTOWN-L mail, and documentation
Marist's LISTSERV lists
Computer Associates - VM
- Technical Support
- EasyTrieve and VMLIB
- VM:Manager products (formerly from Sterling): CA-VM:Archiver, CA-VM:Backup, CA-VM:Schedule, and CA-VM:Secure
Virtual Software Systems, Inc. - vendor for VTAPE ( VTAPE documentation)
SPEDIT :)
IBM - VM Home page and product support dates
IBM Support online - IBM logon (use for prior IBMLINK) - IBM Invoices online (need id and password), software pricing (include mainframe MSU ratings), hardware inventory online
Blue Gene - super computing
TN3270 home page
Plans for MIT applications on VM 12/12/2006 (temporarily unavailable)
Mainframe conversions - links to article re: issues