December 2022: new timeframe for migrating Portico to the Cloud

UCL's ambition to modernise Portico, our student information system, by migrating this critical service to Tribal Cloud is on schedule to take place in December 2022. Staff have been working closely with our partner Tribal to make sure the new Cloud application will deliver an operationally resilient and secure service for the future with greater flexibility to scale the service to meet demand at busy times.

The window for switching over to the Cloud is expected to be between 8-12 December 2022. Portico and associated services, such as Payonline, UCL Select and the Applicant Portal will be unavailable during this time. Every effort will be made to keep the outage to a minimum. The exact timing will be confirmed in the next few weeks.

Please note that the application processes for extenuating circumstances and interruptions will be unavailable while Portico is offline. Staff are encouraged to process applications in-progress ahead of the outage where possible and reassure students new applications can be submitted as soon as the service is restored.

Over the next few weeks, the Portico Cloud application will go through the final stages of user acceptance testing to make sure the migrated service will continue to operate as expected. Services that are integrated with Portico, such as Moodle and the timetabling system (CMIS), are also being tested. Using this approach will facilitate the detection and resolution of any remaining issues at the earliest opportunity, keeping the outage duration and impact on users to a minimum.

Following the migration, Portico eVision is expected to look and function as it does today so there will be no need for re-training. Users will continue to have access to the same processes and reports as they do now.

Briefing sessions are being arranged to provide information to SITS Client users about a few differences the migration will introduce to the way the application works. invitations will be sent out shortly.

Please share this information with your colleagues to help with planning around this down time. Notification of this interruption of service will be placed on the Portico login screen in advance of the outage period.

Contact email for further information: isd.sitsmodernisation@ucl.ac.uk