About Caffeine Break
The short URL for this page is: https://go.illinois.edu/CaffeineBreakSchedule
We’re a weekly meeting (Fridays at 9 am central) where we alternate between topical speakers and open agendas for freeform conversation.
- If you want to get in touch about an idea, email caffeinebreak-committee@lists.illinois.edu.
- If you want to get notified about upcoming Caffeine Break events, you can either join CCSP or (if you want Caffeine Break only) join caffeinebreak@lists.illinois.edu. (This KB article has more about how to subscribe to mailing lists, and other campus IT mailing lists.)
Contents
Guide for new committee members
Roles and processes
Here’s how we plan to subdivide the Caffeine Break roles between organizer, host, and post processing in 2022 and beyond.
History
Check the video archive
Want to see a past Caffeine Break event? Log in to Mediaspace and check out the Caffeine Break tag.
Not sure what topics we’ve covered? Check the Caffeine Break Scheduling History page for what we’ve covered when!
2025 schedule
November
Organizer: Matt Macomber
Post-processor: Kelly Delahanty
- Nov. 7 – ITPF Feedback
- Nov. 14 – Service Request Management (Allison Lappin, Enterprise Service Management Office) (Host: Dena)
- Nov. 21 – Macs
- (Nov. 28 – out for Thanksgiving break)
December
Organizer: Dena
Post-processor:Priya Ravi
- Dec. 5 – Open Agenda
- Dec. 12 – Web Accessibility Basics (Keith Hays)
- Dec. 19 – Mac week (hybrid – Apple engineer will be on campus)
- (Dec. 26 – def. holiday)
2026 Schedule
January
*Note: we should see if someone wants to do a tie in to the Privacy Everywhere conference that’s happening on Jan 28
Organizer: Matt Macomber
Post-processor: Kelly Delahanty
- Jan 2: (Skipped – figuring lots of folks will be on vacation)
- Jan 9: Privacy Everywhere conference “Preview” (Sheena Bishop and team)
- Jan 16: Open Agenda
- Jan 23: JB Nicholson, Martinet
- Jan 30: Macs
February
Organizer: Matt
Post-processor: Priya
- Feb 6: Eric Kurt, Media Commons and IDEA Lab
- Feb 13: Open Agenda
- Feb. 20: Open Town Hall on Migrating from Vmware to Proxmox (Darius Summerville)
- Feb. 27: Macs
March
Organizer: Kelly
Post-processor: Priya (tentatively, might be taking some time off)
Possible presentation by Jim Hurst, or Nick Baumgartner on alternative access plans
Pitch-hit: Show and tell discussion? intro to ux research methods?
- Mar. 6: Nick Baumgartner, Alternative Access Plans
- Mar. 13: Bryan Jonker, Resource Repository
- Mar. 20: Open Agenda
- Mar. 27: Macs
April
Organizer: Dena
Post-processor: Matt Macomber
- Apr. 3: IVCB at U of I (Integrated and Value-Centered Budgeting by Jim Hurst and Jamie Hackett)
- Apr. 10: Webcon – open agenda, probably without a formal host
- Apr. 17: Matt Macomber – How to Prioritize Accessibility Issues and Projects
- Apr. 24: Macs
May
Organizer: Matt Macomber
Post-processor: Priya
- May 1: Allison Lappin and IT Pro panel, Building and Running Reports in TDX
- May 8: Eric Frahm, Discussing the Junk Mail Filtering Event
- May 15: Mike Cervone, Microsoft Copilot Researcher and Analyst Agents
- May 22: Q&A Session for Potential IT Pro Resource Hub
- May 29: Macs
June
Organizer: Kelly Delahanty
Post-processor: Priya
- June 5: ITPF feedback
- June 12: Upcoming UEFI Secure Boot Certificate Expiration (Drew Coobs)
- June 19: Juneteenth Holiday, No Caffeine Break
- June 26: Macs
July
Organizer: Kelly Delahanty
Post-processor: Matt Macomber
- July 3: Vacation Day, No Caffeine Break (Observed 4th of July)
- July 10: Records and Information Management Overview for IT Professionals (Spenser Bailey and G Mast)
- July 17: Bring us your accessibility headscratchers
- July 24: Courtney Fleeger and Mark McCarthy, Recognition, Power, and Equity in IT Work
- July 31: Macs
August
Organizer: Matt Macomber
Post-processor: _____
- Aug. 7 – Mike Cervone, Google AI
- Aug. 14 – Janet Jones, RightFax alternatives
- Aug. 21 – Start of school year concerns/updates?
- Aug. 28 – Macs
September
Organizer: Dena
Post-processor: _____
- Sept. 5 – Conversation about what topics people would like to see at IT Pro Forum and who might be interested in presenting them? (Spring list of ideas collected at https://go.illinois.edu/itpf-spring24feedback, suggested chat 3 months ahead)
- Sept. 12 –
- Sept. 19 – Macs? (offset in Sept. 2025, confirm for 2026)
- Sept. 26 –
October
Organizer: ______
Post-processor: _______
- Oct. 2 –
- Oct. 9 –
- Oct. 16 –
- Oct. 23 –
- Oct. 30 – Macs
November
Organizer: ______
Post-processor: _______
- Nov. 6 – (Probably ITPF Feedback, confirm)
- Nov. 13 –
- Nov. 20 – Macs
- (Nov. 27 – out for Thanksgiving break)
December
Organizer: _______
Post-processor: _____
- Dec. 4 – Web Accessibility Basics (Keith Hays)
- Dec. 11 – (Confirm Mac date)
- Dec. 18 –
- (Dec. 25 – def. holiday)
Future Topic Ideas
Mac Week time shifts in 2026
Backups / in Case of Cancellation
- (may become ITPF proposal instead?) Dena?, New IT Pro Orientation (got the bones at http://go.illinois.edu/ITProOrientation, should fill out more) (movable)
- Reference interviews (Piper? Dena?)
- Kelly Delahanty – What D&D taught me about UX
Topics Ideas
- Collective IT AMA (Invite all IT folks to attend and ask general questions that others attending hopefully answer!)
- Sharing Professional Development Opportunities Open Agenda (conferences, trainings, certification programs, etc.)
- From Chris C: https://www.ncsa.illinois.edu/security-in-quantum-computing/ – a session on quantum resistant crypto
- From Lindsay: Rohan Marwaha would be a good contact for the Illinois Chat AI.
- Best practices for creating training materials (requested by G Mast, speaker might be someone in Rims?)
- More AI focused topics
- AI and coding/development
- Microsoft Co-pilot
- AI and ethics
- source/training data
- use of AI to replace labor
- job security
- outsourcing thinking, learning rudimentary skills
- image/stereotypes
- accuracy
- environmental factors
- plagiarism
- Caffeine Break topic ideas – The larger ideas collection of things that need more work/more contacts to turn into a particular proposal
- Kelly – Card sort / Treejack test
- Accessibility
- How to make forms accessible
- Make accessible canvas course, how to support canvas course (Lindsey Sharp?)
- How to use NVDA
- How to Mac Voiceover
- (Campus) resources for accessible
- figuring out how to work accessibility into what they’re already doing
- Accessibility/alt text for complex images (data visualization, art work, etc)
- Jooyong Seo (ischool?)
- Topic Ideas from 9/27/24 Open Agenda
- End of life OS support/exception requests (Brought up by Mar Taylor because he was struggling to find information about it, information about Virtual infrastructure/hosting)
- Where do you find information on campus? Where are different places to search?
- Answers (System, Urbana, other campus instances are different?)
- Training site
- BUSFIN site
- TDX
- Where did different wiki resources end up?
- Individual department/unit sites?
- Other resources?
- Best practices for documentation
- for public vs for IT folks
- internal vs public (ie putting on answers
- updated guidance about passwords from NIST https://pages.nist.gov/800-63-4/sp800-63b.html#passwordver
- will university be updating process/guidance/rules?
- Chris Clausen – Group management service accounts/managing password changes for service accounts (might be able to talk in spring)
- Endpoint management/service group (Paul Roberts?) – talking about new Microsoft inservice tool/whatever the Mac equivalent is (brought up by Chris Clausen, thought they might be interested in talking in Spring about new tools?)
Open discussion topics
- Tool show-and-tells, focused on specific types of tools
- Productivity
- Note taking
- UX Research
- Diagramming/whiteboards
- Prototyping
- Accessibility
- Data viz
- etc
- How do you organize your files/workspace/bookmarks/resources/etc? Personal project management? (Done before, can revisit)
- Social/Casual Discussions
- Caffeine Break on Caffeine! Free roam discussion?
- Books (Done before, can revisit)
- TV/Movies
- Games (Board games, TTRPG, Video games)
- Gardening (do in Spring, probably March)
- Craft/DIY projects
- Recommendations on fun/new/useful tech that people use either for work or recreationally (something like “what’s in your bookmarks?”)