The Help Desk Top 10

Ever wonder what the folks at the Help Desk answer most often?  Below is our top 10, as well as a copy you can download (PDF) if you’d like. 1. Did your account get locked after hours? Wait a full 30 minutes for your account to unlock on its own before trying again. 2. Did you know that we have online tutorials for free, 24/7/365? Pick a topic, watch a short video: http://bit.ly/itstrainings 3. Have a guest visiting campus? Have them connect to SwatGuest and open a web browser (e.g. Chrome, Firefox, Safari) for further instructions on how to connect to … Continue reading The Help Desk Top 10

New Version of MathType

ITS has the newest edition of Math Type available for download for faculty, staff, and students here:ITS Software MathType 6.7 New Features: Virtually all MathType features are enhanced in each major release. Here are some major new features in MathType 6.7. To learn more about these features, visit our Full Feature List. Mac OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion Support: MathType now supports Mac OS X 10.4.9 Tiger or later, including version 10.8 Mountain Lion. Apple iWork ’09 Support: Apple has picked MathType as its equation editor. If MathType is installed, a MathType Equation item appears on the Insert menu in … Continue reading New Version of MathType

If You Spill Something, Say Something.

Liquid Spills on Portable Computers Spilling a liquid on your laptop can be a real problem, but accidents happen and there are a few steps you can take to minimize the damage. Most importantly, don’t try to restart the computer if it has shut down. If the computer is still running, perform a forced shutdown by pressing and holding down the power button until the computer shuts off. (Count to ten slowly while you hold down the power button). Next, the battery should be removed. If you have a Dell or almost any other brand of PC this is easy … Continue reading If You Spill Something, Say Something.

UPDATED: Protect the Data on Your iDevice (iPad, iPhone, etc.)

There are three easy actions you can take to immensely enhance the data protection capabilities of your “iDevice” and your investment in it.  These are particularly important if you access any College or personal data with your device. 1) Use an alphanumeric passcode iPads and iPhones can actually encrypt the data they contain!  However, to utilize this capability, a passcode has to be set.  Although a four-digit passcode will minimally suffice (there’s software available to easily crack these), the best option is to enable the use of alphanumeric passcodes.  This is done by going into Settings and then selecting General … Continue reading UPDATED: Protect the Data on Your iDevice (iPad, iPhone, etc.)

Windows 8 Announcement

Microsoft released Windows 8 on October 26th, 2012 and most Windows hardware vendors are now shipping systems with Windows 8 installed. ITS Recommendation Information Technology Services (ITS) will support Windows 8 for our clients, including off-campus students, on new systems that ship with Windows 8 pre-installed. ITS strongly recommends that College community members thinking of upgrading to Windows 8 adopt a “wait and see” approach, continuing to use earlier supported versions of Windows (Windows 7 SP1 and Windows XP SP3) until the initial bugs and compatibility issues in Windows 8 are identified and fixed. It is ITS policy to test … Continue reading Windows 8 Announcement

Java – The Hacker’s Best Friend

Some of you may have heard that a significant security vulnerability was disclosed recently that affects pretty much all versions of Java. Oracle (who now owns Java) seemed to be dragging their feet on providing a fix until they felt some heat from the U.S. Government. A fix was made available today but only for users of Java version 7. Java runs on all operating systems so Mac users are impacted along with PC users.  Note: there won’t be a fix available for Mac users with Snow Leopard or earlier so your best option is to totally disable Java. How … Continue reading Java – The Hacker’s Best Friend