NEWS: Modems Down June 12^th for Number Changes

June 2, 2000

The Springfield off-campus dial up modem services will be down for service on June 12, 2000.  The Southwestern Bell circuits will be disconnected and MCI WorldCom circuits will be activated.  This means that the 417-875-6996 number will permanently be deactivated on June 12, 2000.  The new MCI WorldCom number of 417-521-1234 will take its place by June 13, 2000.  The Express modem pool should remain active through this transition for those still needing to connect during the outage.  The on-campus modem pool number will also change to 9,521-1234.  For an interim period of time, the 9,875-6996 number will work for on-campus users only, however, that number will be phased out by July 12th and it is recommended users change to the new number quickly.  Current dialup phone numbers and instructions on how to change numbers on your computer using the Missouri State University dialup software are maintained on the web.

The University contracts communications circuits by a bid process which, by law, must occur from time to time.  Our contract with Southwestern Bell for circuits used by our dial up modems expires on June 30th, 2000.  MCI WorldCom was the successful bidder this time and will be our new provider for these types of communication services.  Although a service called "number portability" is now offered by the phone companies, we chose not to use this feature due to ongoing costs and due to the fact that the extra communication linkages would result in degraded connection rates for our users.

On the morning of June 12, 2000, Networking will disconnect the PRI (ISDN Primary Rate Interface) circuits from Southwestern Bell, reprogram all communication servers, and attach the new MCI WorldCom circuits by the end of the day.  Once disconnected, the old number will not return to service unless unforeseen circumstances dictate a return to the SWBT circuits.  The new number will intermittently be in service on June 12th, but users are advised to use the Express pool (currently with a 2 hour limit) until June 13th.

No other dialup service is affected (West Plains, Mt. Grove, or the Express Modems).  If you have further questions or concerns regarding this change, please contact Mark Harsen in Computer Services Networking.