ITC Announcement/UVa-Anywhere Now Available

December 16, 2002

UVa-Anywhere is now available for download and installation by members of the U.Va. community. A Virtual Private Network (VPN) client, UVa-Anywhere provides secure connections to the U.Va. network from off Grounds, as well as affording access to many networked resources that are not otherwise available to remote users.

Under normal circumstances, machines that connect to U.Va. from off Grounds via the Internet are assigned non-U.Va. IP addresses. When communicating via the UVa-Anywhere client, though, a machine is assigned a U.Va.-owned address. That can be important when the user wants to access certain University Library collections, online databases, servers, or other resources to which access is restricted by IP address. UVa-Anywhere offers other benefits as well; it can solve problems or alleviate inconvenience for people who are currently having trouble ...

• connecting to their Home Directory accounts from off Grounds;
• using resources through the U.Va. proxy server; or
• reconfiguring their email program back and forth between their ISP's email (SMTP) server and the University's.

UVa-Anywhere also provides a more secure (encrypted) connection to the U.Va. network than is possible using other methods.

To get started using UVa-Anywhere, you must first download and install a U.Va. personal security certificate, and then download and set up the UVa-Anywhere VPN software. A Quick Start guide and detailed instructions are available at http://www.itc.virginia.edu/desktop/pki/vpn/home.html.

Please note the following before installing UVa-Anywhere:

• UVa-Anywhere is for off-Grounds use only. The product provides no additional functionality for on-Grounds users, who already benefit from University IP addresses and secure communications.
• UVa-Anywhere is currently a Windows product only. ITC is working to develop a Macintosh solution as well.

Members of the U.Va. community who are already using the Integrated Systems (Oracle) VPN do not need to switch to UVa-Anywhere unless they wish to connect to U.Va. resources other than the Oracle applications. For ISP users who do want to switch, UVa-Anywhere includes an Oracle profile for use with the Integrated Systems, in addition to the generic profile for use with other resources. Please note that if you are plannning to upgrade from an existing Integrated Systems VPN client to the UVa-Anywhere client, you must first uninstall the existing client.

If you have any problems installing or using UVa-Anywhere, please contact the ITC Help Desk at 924-3731 for assistance.