Work Orders

We will be completing the campus-wide conversion from Windows 2000 to Windows XP in the next few weeks. If you'd like to be at the top of our conversion priority list, please contact the Computer Services Helpdesk at 294-1950 for a work order.

If your department is renovating or reorganizing and you need additional network or telephone lines, please initiate that request through the Helpdesk. Our network technicians can coordinate that process with the Physical Plant personnel or the external contractors. Let us get involved from the beginning phases to ensure the infrastructure is in place and the University standards are met. It'll save time and money later!

Macintosh OS X Users: You may now submit a work order through the Helpdesk to have Adobe Acrobat individually installed on your workstation. Faculty members will be using this new software for the Curriculum Form B Request for Addition of a New Course.

Switch from "Social Security" for "Security"

Enrolled SHSU students should not be required to provide their social security numbers on online forms or hard-copy documents (other than payroll items). Students should always be given the option of submitting documents with their SamID instead. Please carefully review your forms, programs, and web sites. If you have any problems with easily processing the submissions with the SamID instead, please contact the Helpdesk for assistance.

Note: Never include the student social security number in the subject of an e-mail message.

Media Circus

We would like to thank all of the presenters for an excellent show and all of the attendees for making the Circus a success. Special thanks to the NGL for helping provide the snacks. Lots of interesting innovations were demonstrated: from tablet PCs to the ILLIAD inter-library loan system. If you'd like to learn more about how you can use technology to enhance your research or teaching, contact James Van Roekel.

On September 30, Maxine Clarke from the Office of the Vice President for Academic Affairs drew the winning tickets for the Media Circus door prizes. Congrats to Beverly Irby from the Department of Education, Leadership, and Counseling. Her entry earned her department the laptop grand prize. The laptop was provided by James Van Roekel's Office of Academic Instructional Technology and Distance Learning.

The Department of Computer Services provided memory sticks as door prizes. The winners are Don Brown from Finance, Caron Cates from Sociology, and Judy Smith from Undergraduate Admissions. Congratulations to all. The recipients may phone the Helpdesk at 41950 to claim their 64 MB memory sticks. (They're on order at this moment.)

Memory sticks are a great replacement for floppy disks---much more reliable, providing significantly more storage, and they can be used with any USB port. Since many of the new machines are now being built without a floppy disk drive, we encourage administrative and academic users to transition to this new storage device. Currently, a 64 MB memory stick is $28.55. If you would like to purchase some for your department, you can contact Junie Hunt for assistance.

Blackboard

We are currently working with Blackboard to clear up the course statistics glitch and the gradebook inconsistencies that some faculty have intermittently been experiencing.

Don't let those problems discourage you! Blackboard can be used for administrative areas as well as in the classroom. There's a calendar included within Bb, and it can be a great method of collaborating on a major project or committee. If you are interested in getting organized with Blackboard, contact Jacob Spradlin to arrange a special training session. Check out the Training Calendar for other sessions.

You've Got Mass Mail!

If you'd like to send a mailing to the entire faculty or campus, please first forward the e-mail through your associate vice president or your vice president for approval. After you receive approval, you may forward it to the Helpdesk, and one of our staff members will complete the e-mail processing. Attachments will be posted on the web and linked in the e-mail as a URL so that the threat of viruses is diminished.

If you have created the e-mail in an HTML format, many University recipients will not be able to open it. Users have the ability to set up their various e-mail formats as they wish. Due to formatting differences, to ensure all your recipients can view your e-mail, you must also provide it in a straight text format.

Users: if you are receiving these mass e-mails as a blank message, please let the Helpdesk know. We need additional specifics to determine if we can help correct it.

Up Close and Personal

The programming for the creation of Dr. Gaertner's University Online Pictorial Directory is now complete. However, not all the pictures are online yet. We have approximately 250 photographs that have not yet been re-sized. The process is ongoing to get photos of all the faculty/staff, and to re-size the photos for inclusion. If you have not yet done so and would like your photo included, you may contact the Helpdesk at 41950 to set up an appointment for one of our staff or students to come take your picture.

This system is password-protected to ensure that only SHSU faculty and staff have permission to view the photos. You may click Intranet, SamWeb, and then log in with your SHSU username and password. You will select the + sign to open the SamInfo directory, open the Human Resources directory, and then select the SHSU Directory. The search will work the same as the Google Search on the main University page for directory information----except it will include the photos.

Training

The Adobe customer service representative, Tom Dent, will be here Wednesday, October 15th providing training. This will be held in the LSC Theatre at 10 a.m.; so there will be plenty of room to come learn all about the features and options. Adobe Acrobat 6.0 comes with the capability to publish as PDF, create text boxes for online form completion, and provide authenticated signatures. This is the software you will be utilizing in future revisions of the University Administrative Policies and Procedures. Here's an opportunity to learn from the expert; sign up now.

• PC users: You may install Adobe Acrobat by selecting Start, Programs, SHSU Installation Menu, Publishing, Adobe Acrobat 6.
• Macintosh OS X Users: You may submit a work order through the Helpdesk to have Adobe Acrobat individually installed on your workstation.

Review the Training Calendar for details on other sessions.

Software Packages

The University purchased and installed Mathematica several months ago. and since this product is considered the Cadillac of math applications, we are not planning to purchase new versions of Maple, MatLab, and Minitab. We have not received any academic requests for this year for this software, so we will remove it from the network by the Spring Semester.

We have just renewed our Microsoft Campus Agreement. This agreement allows faculty and administrative staff members to have copies of Microsoft Office XP for their home work use. You may check out the CD from the Helpdesk after submitting the online request form. Due to the new pricing schedule from Microsoft, our agreement does not include the software for FrontPage.

Your input is always needed to ensure the software purchased, installed, and maintained on the Network is what you need to most effectively perform your administrative duties, conduct your research, and/or teach your classes. For academic purposes, if you will be using a software package in your classes in Spring 2004, you must submit that support request by November 1st---even if this is something currently on the system. We cannot budget our time or funding to ensure your software is available unless you give us a heads-up.

New Staff

The Post Office added a new staff member in August. Marilyn Adams is originally from Trinidad and is a graduate in the field of accountancy. Marilyn will be assisting you at the counter---so be sure to welcome her to Sam Houston State.

In September, Will Bending was hired fulltime as a Computer Network Technician for Computer Services. Will has four years of experience at SHSU as a student worker for Computer Services and TRIES. He graduated from SHSU in May 2003 with a B.S. in Computing Science.