FACE VALUEDan Robinson

IT Guy With <Style>

DOUG BURG

Dan Robinson ’01, associate director of computing services, joined Northwestern’s staff in 2002 and was promoted to his current position in 2015. In his previous role as web development manager, he developed the college’s award-winning website.

Your dad [Rob] was the director of NWC’s computing services department from 1983 to 2000. Did that influence your interest in the field?
Northwestern has been a part of my life for 34 years. Growing up, I would help my dad run network cables through the many different tunnels or under the floors around campus because I was small enough to fit! I have learned a lot from my dad, and I really look up to him in so many ways. His position as director absolutely had a positive influence on my choosing to work in the same field.

You built the college’s website. What feature or design element are you most proud of?
I think the one thing I am most proud of is something you don’t actually see. When creating the website, I really wanted to make working within the site and uploading content as easy as possible for those who are not as technologically inclined. To accomplish this, I wrote a content management system that enables staff to easily update information in a visual manner while still integrating Northwestern’s many data sources and custom programming scripts.

What is your favorite part of your job?
I really enjoy researching and implementing innovative solutions to improve our network and make technology more accessible to our students, faculty and staff. I also enjoy the camaraderie we have in the computing services department. The people I work with are awesome, and I consider them family.

Besides a background in web design, do you have any other artistic outlets?
I play guitar and will occasionally help lead worship at my church. Guitar is my go-to when I need to relieve some stress or just veg out (maybe sometimes a little too much). I also enjoy learning about video editing and recently began producing videos for a local nonprofit.

What are some of your other hobbies?
Spending time with my wife and three children, coaching youth sports, and programming just for fun.

What have you recently programmed “just for fun?”
Lately I have been trying to get different things to interface with our Amazon Echo. I am working on getting Alexa to answer “What’s for lunch?” by announcing my kids’ school lunch menu for the day.

What’s one of the most unusual help desk calls you can remember your department dealing with?
One time a student brought in a laptop with melted chocolate all over the motherboard. To this day we are still completely baffled as to how that much chocolate got inside a laptop!