Winter 2010 |
Welcome
Shawn Beattie, ITS, editor
Welcome
to Augie Techknowledge
from ITS, an e-newsletter to share "what's new" in ITS and provide
useful tips
and articles on Information Technology at Augustana.
We hope you like it and find it useful. The newsletter will
be archived on
the ITS web site at
http://www.augustana.edu/itsfiles/techknowledge.
Enjoy!
In this issue:
Netbooks in the Computing Spectrum
Emails to delete & ignore
Students: Google Apps Training Coming Soon
Switching to Seven
Cell phones in the classroom?
Best wishes to Dennis Hurd
Tip: How to Drag Content in Word
Netbooks
in the Computing Spectrum Shawn Beattie, ITS |
In the past two years or so, a new category of
small laptops has formed. Called netbooks, they are now a prominent
fixture in libraries, Starbucks, and commuter trains all over the country.
Most users adopt these as a second or third PC. So, what is a netbook and
why would you want one? A netbook is defined by some as merely a miniature
laptop; others define it by both size and price. Typically costing less
than $400, netbooks offer a smaller screen, smaller keyboard, and a slower
processor. However, netbooks are plenty fast for simple e-mail and
web-browsing. Hence, netbook users are willing to sacrifice screen real
estate and speed for less weight, lower cost, and longer battery life -- usually
5 to 6 hours. Weighing in at a tiny 2 pounds or about 1 kilogram, one notable item that
is also missing from these computers is an optical drive. In the era of
cheap flash drives, most people do not miss the optical drive until they try to
install software from CDs. For those of you who do purchase a netbook and need to install software from CD, ITS
has two USB CD-ROM drives available for checkout.
It is unclear whether Apple's recently announced iPad falls in the netbook
category or is more of an e-book, like the Amazon Kindle DX. Personal
computing has become more of a spectrum of devices from smartphones to desktop
PCs. Many devices like the iPad will eschew categorization and merely take
their place in the spectrum. So, whether you browse on a Blackberry,
compute on a Kindle, message on a Macbook, or note-take on a netbook -- happy
computing!
Emails to
delete & ignore Scott Dean, ITS |
Several people have reported receiving an email from "Augustana College" stating that maintenance and upgrades are being done on our website and asking for your user name and password.
These emails do not come from ITS. While they can be annoying, if you do receive messages like these simply delete and ignore them. If you happen to reply with your user name and password you’ll need to change your password immediately. You can easily change your password from an on-campus Windows computer by pressing Ctrl-Alt-Delete and clicking the Change Password button. To change your password from off-campus or from a Mac, use http://moodle.augustana.edu and select the "change your password" link on the left side of the web page. Students can change their e-mail password by logging in and clicking on Settings, then Accounts, and clicking on the "change password" link.
For future reference, we will never ask you for your user name and password via e-mail. You can also spot these scams as they are never from an individual, they are usually from some generic name like ‘Augustana College’ or ‘Augustana Web Team’. For the most part, when we send email out to our users, they’ll come from an individual, not some generic account - and even then, we will not request private information.
Useful tips to avoid becoming a victim of a phishing scam:
As always, if you have any questions or concerns please let me know at scottdean@augustana.edu.
Students: Google Apps Training Coming Soon Shawn Beattie and Beth Whitty, ITS |
Students - have you been utilizing your @augustana.edu Google Apps account for just e-mail? There's much more that you can do! Organizing your life with Google's calendar, sharing documents with other students, storing files safely, and creating simple but attractive web pages are all features available just a few clicks away. This spring, ITS will be offering four short sessions showing you exactly how to take advantage of some of these features. You might want to put these dates & times in your....Google Calendar!
3/17 Wed 4:00-5:00pm
Using Google Apps to share & edit documents with other students
3/22 Mon 4:00-5:00pm
Using Google Sites to create your own web page
3/24 Wed 4:00-5:00pm
Using Google Apps to share & edit documents with other students
3/29 Mon 4:00-5:00pm
Using Google Sites to create your own web page
All workshops will be held in Olin 110
At the end of the Spring term, ITS will begin the process of upgrading campus Windows XP computers to Microsoft’s newest operating system, Windows 7. Augustana campus PC’s have been running XP for about 8 years-- a long life in the world of technology. Despite Microsoft’s release of Vista, the predecessor of Windows 7, ITS did not migrate the campus due to industry wide concerns regarding the reliability of Vista, incompatibility with existing hardware as well as the absence of major software vendors willing to redesign their software to conform to Vista. Additionally many students remained on XP, many even ordering new machines with the older operating system.
Professional reviews of Windows 7 however are much more positive and indicate 7 is a much more stable environment than Windows XP or Vista. Printers, scanners, external drives and other hardware accessories attach seamlessly, securing any necessary drivers automatically from the web. Major software vendors such as Adobe, SPSS, and Datatel have released versions compatible with Windows 7. Most students are arriving on campus with Windows 7 installed on their PC’s.
Don’t worry, there will be many opportunities for learning about the new features. On the screen, Windows 7 is not much different from XP, certainly nowhere near the changes Microsoft incorporated into Office 2007 products. Accessing programs by double clicking on icons placed on the desktop continues, as well as the venerable “Start” button.
One of the more interesting features of Windows 7 is a new task bar. The Quick Launch toolbar is gone. A user can now ‘pin’ applications to the toolbar (Internet Explorer and Windows Explorer are here by default). Applications are now launched and managed from the toolbar. All open windows of a given application will be grouped together under a single icon. A user can simply hover over this icon to get a thumbnail sized live look-in to each window, a feature known as “Aero Peek”. While this may take some getting used to, we really like that it organizes windows better and allows a user to change applications more quickly and easily.
The migration to Windows 7 will begin in the student computer labs. Unfortunately, updating PCs with the new operating system requires backing up files and settings, erasing the hard drive and installing Windows 7, followed by restoring software, files, and settings. This type of upgrade is time consuming and upgrading the labs will likely take most of the summer months. ITS will be working with faculty, staff and administrative offices to find a convenient time to upgrade office PCs as a group throughout the 2010-11 academic year. The goal is to have all of the campus windows machines upgraded to Windows 7 by summer 2011.
Stay tuned for more information about the upgrade to Windows 7 and don't hesitate to contact me at ChrisVaughan@augustana.edu with questions.
Tip: How to Drag content in Word
|
When you need to copy information from one Word 2007 document
to another, you could use the Copy button to copy the selected information
from one document, open the destination document, click where you want to
insert it, and then click the Paste button. Or, you could just right-click
and drag the information from one document to another. Word 2007’s View Side
By Side feature makes it easy to do just that. Let’s say you want to copy a picture in Document A to Document B. Follow these steps: 1. Open Document A. 2. Open Document B and scroll to where you want to insert the picture. 3. Click the View tab. 4. Click the View Side By Side command in the Window group. 5. Click in Document B and then click Window under the View tab. 6. Click Synchronous Scrolling to turn it off. 7. Select the picture in Document A. 8. Right-click and drag the selected picture to where you want to insert the picture in Document B. 9. Release the mouse button and select Copy Here. 10. After copying your selections, you can turn off the View Side By Side feature by clicking Window under the View tab of the active window and then clicking the View Side By Side command. |
Click to see information about
upcoming ITS workshops
Have a great Spring Break!
-ITS