SHSU Information Resources Update

Unified Messaging

All offices will soon have voice over IP (VoIP) phones. All SHSU e-mail will soon be managed through Microsoft Exchange 2007. And here's the interesting part of that story that perhaps we have not specifically announced: your SHSU e-mail (including your contacts and calendar) and SHSU voice mail will be "unified."

You can listen to your voice mail (VM) on your phone (as always) OR by clicking in your Outlook e-mail.
- Benefit: You can do everything in one place.
You can read your e-mail in your e-mail (as always) OR by listening to it in your voice mail (even if you are walking on the beach somewhere!)
- Benefit: If you cannot (or don't want to) get to a computer with Internet capabilities, you can still check e-mail.
You can also respond directly to an e-mail message from your voice mail.
- Same benefit as above: Even when you do not have access to a computer, you can answer an e-mail directly from a phone.
When away from your office, you can easily check your VM. Just call your office phone number, press the asterisk when you hear your outgoing greeting, enter your phone PIN, and listen to your voice mail and e-mail.
- Benefit: you don't have to memorize any other numbers to get to the VM system.
You can listen to and update your Outlook calendar entries from your phone.
- Benefit: You can figure out where you are supposed to be without a computer connection. It will actually tell you that you're supposed to be in a meeting at that moment!
From a phone, you can leave a VM that will be mailed to the other attendees at your meeting if you're running late (which of course would NEVER happen!)
And more.....

We will be providing training and demonstrations the next couple of weeks to show you the many new functions and address your concerns about the changes.

We are working to accomplish this changeover as painlessly as possible, but it is a huge change: new phones, new voice mail, new e-mail, and a myriad of new features. As much as many of you really hate change, we have confidence that in a short time, you will wonder how you ever managed your multi-tasking without this new system.

We encourage you to sign up and attend one of our sessions (offered on the 3rd, 7th, 16th, and 24th). You may also want to review our online documentation.

TMI

You may hear someone complaining that someone shared TMI! The acronym for "too much information" usually refers to an embarrassing personal tidbit. However, as staff and faculty members, you are continuously bombarded by TMI, even if it is necessary for certain functions.

You may be privy to confidential academic, personal, and financial information. You may see credit card numbers, home phone numbers, grades, social security numbers, or medical excuses.

Even though many of you would never think to discuss it with people outside of your work environment, you may not be as careful as you should be with where/how you are storing it. Please look again at your own business practices in your office. Take the time now to protect your department and your information.

Do a departmental audit today and record the fact that you've done so.
Make absolutely certain that if you save confidential items in computer files that only designated individuals can see them. Ask someone else to test it to make sure they cannot see them.
Make sure you have your filing cabinets locked when unattended if you have social security numbers or other private matters stored there.
Identify any places that you are still using social security numbers and ask the question why. Make sure you switch to SamID's unless a legal requirement prohibits that change.
Ask the SHSU Business Office for advice before you accept payments by credit card or other methods.
Please work with everyone in your department to ensure your full-time, as well as, part-time staff are on the lookout for any slip-ups. It "takes a village" to ensure SHSU is not a headline story for identify theft.

Training

This month we're offering training on the new VoIP phones and e-mail system, editing web pages with Contribute, using Blackboard's new Grade Center, and exporting and archiving your Blackboard courses. Check the Calendar for class times and sign up now to reserve your seat. You may also request one-on-one training or training for your department. Just e-mail the Helpdesk.

Blackboard: The Old Days

On Monday July 14th, the old Blackboard server will be taken down for good. This only impacts the following courses:

    * Spring 2006
    * Minimester 2006
    * Summer I & II 2006
    * Fall 2006
    * Spring 2007
    * Minimester 2007
    * Summer I & II 2007

If you still have information in those classes that you need, now's the time to save it. From the Blackboard Login page, click on OLD Blackboard Course Login.

If you have any questions about this matter or would like assistance in migrating data to the new server from the old, please contact the Blackboard Team at 936.294.4495 or e-mail blackboard@shsu.edu.

Blackboard: The New Days

Save the date of August 15th for Blackboard Day. Our third Blackboard Day will be in the Criminal Justice Center Hazel B. Kerper Courtroom. Blackboard Day is an all-day conference. Topics include:

The Grade Center
Self and Peer Assessment
Wikis and Blogs
Respondus
Audacity

Sign up now to attend the conference or the conference/lunch. The first 100 to sign up will receive a headphone/microphone for use with Audacity!

If you are willing to make a presentation on something great that you are doing with Blackboard, let us know. We still have space in the schedule, and your fellow faculty appreciate the sessions more when they know the speaker is truly in the trenches.

Protecting the Campus E-mail System

Especially of late, evildoers have tried to wreak havoc from e-mails. E-maill attachments with programs embedded can cause lots of problems for your workstation, data, and the network. This mischief can be accomplished quite simply by putting a program (an executable) in the file and hiding the true file type with an extra period.

Unfortunately, a few bad apples really can spoil it for everyone. Inform your contacts, students, and others regarding the proper e-mail attachment protocol: SHSU cannot accept e-mails that have extra periods in the title.

Take preventive action to notify your senders. For instance, if you are dealing with a vendor quote, specify in the bid request how they should entitle their submission. In other words, a Microsoft Excel file may be named "fiscalyear08.xlsx". The period which separates the name and the file extension type is fine. However, a file named "fiscalyear.08.xlsx" would not be allowed.

Therefore, even when you feel confident your sender is sending only innocent files, our mailing system will be stripping the attachment. You will have to write the sender back and ask them to please rename the file without the improper characters. It's an inconvenience, but a necessary one.

The Staff at UCS

So many of you have been kind to express your concern for our staff during this past tough year. Thank you!

Here's an update on our situation. We currently have 138 student assistants and 56 fulltime staff members. Fifteen of the 56 fulltimers were hired during the 2007-2008 academic year. So the good news is that we've got an influx of new talent! The bad news you have already noticed as we've been just swamped dealing with all the change and rebuilding the insitutional knowledge base.

We are advertising for three open positions: two in the UCS-Systems department and one in the UCS-Administrative Applications department. We are continuing to evaluate the budget and our needs to identify the positions most needed as we move forward.

What's Good, What's Not, and What's Happening When?

The Helpdesk provides support for university equipment and software on the local area network. Each month's update will include the versions of software and minimum requirements for hardware with the new or changed information highlighted and bolded.

Memory Sticks: Purchase (and encourage your students to buy) flash drives that are USB Mass Storage Compliant.

Operating Systems: The supported version of Macintosh machines will be OS X, version 5 after the Leopard conversion which is underway. The supported version of Microsoft's operating system is Windows XP.

Software Packages: The supported versions of office suites are Microsoft's Office 2007 and WordPerfect 12 for PC's. The new version of an office suite for Macintoshes is Microsoft Office 2008 and is being packaged for installation on campus machines.

Hardware Configurations: The minimum requirements for SHSU local area network support for a PC are a 1Ghz processor, 512MB RAM, and a 40GB disk. Our recommended configuration is for a 2GHz processor, 1GB memory, and 80GB hard drive. The recommended configuration for a Macintosh on the LAN is a 1.6GHz PowerPC Single-core/Single processor, 1GB RAM, and a 40GB hard drive.

Computer Services may schedule significant periods of downtime for major system upgrades and maintenance. For your planning purposes, the weekend following each graduation will be set aside for scheduled outages. Additionally, certain systems may be unavailable on Friday nights after 6 p.m.

All offers, training, and software above pertain to faculty and staff at SHSU only. If you have any questions, compliments, comments, or concerns, please let us know.