Comelec conducts walk-through of transparency server at UST

The Commission on Elections on Saturday conducted a walk-through of the transparency media center at the University of Santo Tomas (UST), attended by members of the media and other election stakeholders for the May 9 local and national polls.

GMA News' Mav Gonzales reported that Comelec officials in attendance included Chairman Saidamen Balt Pangarungan, Commissioners Marlon Casquejo, George Garcia, Rey Bulay, and poll body spokesperson James Jimenez.

Also in attendance were a representative of IT service provider Smartmatic, and Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) board of trustees member Riza Mantaring.

#Eleksyon2022: @COMELEC, media at iba pang election stakeholders, nag-walkthrough sa Transparency Media Server sa University of Sto. Tomas sa Maynila para sa #Eleksyon2022. | via @mavgonzales pic.twitter.com/yysFf0YwF7

— DZBB Super Radyo (@dzbb) April 30, 2022

During the walk-through, the Comelec assured the public that the transparency server has been tested, and that the unfortunate seven-hour delay in the transmittal of election results in 2019 would not happen again.

Commissioner Casquejo said they already subjected the system to a "stress test" by sending 100,000 and 50,000 results at a time from the transparency server going to the media server and the load of data did not cause the system to malfunction.

#Eleksyon2022: @COMELEC, ipinasilip ang COMELEC Transparency Media Server Center na gagamitin sa #Eleksyon2022.

Dito ipapasa ang mga datos na nakolekta ng central data server mula sa iba’t ibang presinto sa bansa. | via @jhomer_apresto

(????: COMELEC)pic.twitter.com/VQraCqSJHD

— DZBB Super Radyo (@dzbb) April 30, 2022

Casquejo explained that part of the long transmission delay in 2019 was the policy that a resolution from Comelec en banc was required to fix the server glitch. But it could have been done by simply rebooting the server.

Thus, the poll body has made a resolution that the simple rebooting task could be done by the head of the technology transmission group, provided the resource code would not be touched.

Like in the past, Casquejo said there will be a 15-minute interval in the transmission of the results to the media server, but the transmission of poll results from the vote counting machines (VCMs) to the transparency server is real-time.

On the other hand, Engineer Roderick Ylagan of the Comelec IT Department assured the public that the power source at Comelec IFO Pier data center would be continuous as they have a backup facility that will take care of the power supply glitch.

Meanwhile Casquejo said that the Comelec has set aside some P1 billion just for the poll results transmission system alone. —LBG, GMA News