Mobile Update

22 03 2011

The University has been working a lot lately on developing a mobile presence.  Lori Nidoh, our newest TAG member and a representative from the PR office, took a few minutes to write up an update for us:

At the end of this month the University will be launching both a mobile application and a mobile website.  These presentation slides (in PDF) explain the context surrounding our decision to move forward with the mobile projects at this time and provides a preview of the functionality of both.

In addition to the 15 features that will be included in the mobile app at launch, several new modules are in the works for later this year such as Admissions, Alumni and Library.

A promotion plan is in place to support the launch of the mobile application which includes posters and table tents on campus, a slide on the iTower in DeNaples, a story and advertisement in the Aquinas, posts on the University’s social media pages, tiles on the home page of the University’s website as well as on Admissions and other key pages that will link to a splash page containing full details on the app.

The new mobile app will also be featured on billboards and mall posters in our secondary recruiting markets of MA, CT, MD and VA and on upcoming Admissions direct mail pieces and at Preview Day for accepted students in early April. Finally, there will be an official press release and the launch will be featured in the April 5 edition of Royal News.

The mobile website is in the final stages of development, at least for phase I.  You can access it at m.scranton.edu.  The mobile site will have a much quieter entrance – we are looking at ways to insert an icon on the home page and on other pages on the full site where there is a mobile equivalent, and we will include a tile on the mobile app splash page that gives basic info on the mobile site. It will also be announced in Royal News and on the University’s social media sites.  When the new server goes online in early June there will be the ability to have an automatic redirect to the mobile site when the server recognizes a mobile operating system.

We will keep you posted about developments in both the mobile app and site and welcome your feedback and suggestions.

If anyone has questions or comments for Lori, let us know!


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Categories : Announcements, Mobile

Email Transition: Faculty Senate Presentation

11 03 2011

Jeremy and I will be at the Faculty Senate meeting today to do a brief presentation on the email transition to Microsoft Live @ Edu.

For reference, I’m posting my slides, and you can also find my notes here in PDF format.

[slideshare id=7233533&doc=emailtransition2011-110311100121-phpapp01]


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Categories : Email

ANGEL Downtime over Break

11 03 2011

Just a quick update from Jason Wimmer about an upcoming ANGEL downtime:

ANGEL will be unavailable on Thursday, March 24, from 8:00AM – 12:00PM to install Service Pack 9 for Version 7.4.  Thank you for your cooperation.

Thanks to Jason and IR for scheduling the outage during break!


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Categories : Angel and Desire2Learn, Outages

Forefront Replacing McAfee

8 03 2011

Just a reminder to everyone that IR is deploying Microsoft Forefront as new antivirus software (replacing McAfee) on campus computers.  This is great news – McAfee is pretty resource-intensive and often slows down machines.

The week before your computer is scheduled for deployment, you’ll get an email from IT Services.  Installation will happen overnight, starting at 7pm and completing by 4am the following morning.  You won’t be able to use or access your computer during the installation time.  Your machine must be left on during that time since the installation will happen through KBOX.

While Forefront is being installed, your computer name will be changed, so if you use your computer name for peer to peer use, contact the Technology Support Center prior to the day your computer is scheduled for deployment.

This update is only for Windows machines – there will be a change in Mac antivirus software, but that won’t happen until sometime in the future.

TAG has asked IT Services for an implementation schedule, which we’ll post here when we get it.

Let us know if you have any questions, and we’ll do our best to answer!


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Categories : Outages, Security

Academic Technology Plan

8 03 2011

The Provost has invited members of TAG to participate in a spring break retreat with the Deans Group in order to start developing an academic technology plan.

We’d like TAG members to be able to come to the retreat with ideas in mind. I’ll be reviewing some academic technology plans from other universities this week in preparation, but wanted to toss out a few general questions to get some feedback from all of you:

What should be in an academic technology plan?

Where should the University head in terms of technology?

What should be the goals of technology use on campus?

What questions should we discuss with the Deans?

If anyone’s interested in talking face-to-face about ideas for the plan before break, please let me know!


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Categories : Announcements, TAG Administrative

TAG Meeting Notes 3/3

4 03 2011

Just a few quick updates from yesterday’s TAG meeting:

  • We have three new members! Welcome to Dave Dzurec (History), Wesley Wang (Economics/Finance), and Sandy Pesavento (Education).
  • The Classroom Mediation survey has been distributed and is due today (Friday).  There was some confusion reported between the Classroom Mediation survey (which focused on equipment and was distributed by department chairs) and the Knowledge Base survey (which focused on software and was handed out in department meetings visited by TAG members).  Unfortunately, our timing didn’t work out as well as planned.
  • The Identity and Access Management system upgrade is still in progress. User IDs will likely be R numbers, but current email addresses will be carried forward.  You’ll likely be able to log into the my.scranton portal using your email address rather than your R number.
  • We discussed the plan for the email transition and debated how to get the word out about this plan to faculty members.  We recently sent out an email to all full-time faculty via FAC, and Jeremy, Kristen, and Jim will present to the Faculty Senate next Friday (March 11) about the transition plan.  We’re not sure how to reach part-time faculty.
  • TAG members have been visiting academic department meetings, to varying degrees of success.  We’ve gathered a lot of feedback from faculty about their technology needs.  The more specific feedback (e.g., projectors in a certain room not working) can be addressed by IR.  But TAG needs to address some of the larger issues (e.g., how do we get faculty to report problem computers/equipment to Tech Support so that they can be fixed?).
  • Faculty are still concerned about the lack of Mac support on campus, especially for things like antivirus software and uploading files to ANGEL from Safari (though that’s an issue with ANGEL rather than with our IR division).
  • There seems to be a need for discussions with faculty about academic & pedagogical uses of social media tools.  TAG will be looking into this more in the future.
  • There is a reported perception that TAG serves as a mouthpiece for the administration rather than as an independent body – but we’d like to beg to differ.  TAG has been asked by Academic Affairs and Information Resources to provide feedback on technology issues, not to repeat a previously determined message.  And communication between TAG and both Academic Affairs and Information Resources has been two-way rather than one-way.

Thanks to everyone who attended – and as usual, please feel free to address any of these points in the comments!


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Categories : Classroom Mediation, Email, TAG Administrative

Classroom Mediation Surveys due Friday!

28 02 2011

Just a reminder to all teaching faculty that your Classroom Mediation Surveys (the one you got on paper from your department chair) are due to your departmental administrative assistant by Friday, March 4.

This survey was a joint effort between Information Resources, Academic Affairs, the CTLE, and TAG, and the results will be used to inform decisions about how equipment will be allocated in the future – so please take a few minutes to fill it out, your responses are important!

As usual, feel free to let us know if you have any questions about the survey. Thanks, all!


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Categories : Announcements, Classroom Mediation

My.Scranton Downtime on Saturday

28 02 2011

A notice from the Enterprise Infrastructure team, posted to my.scranton and Bboard:

A few remaining electrical service details related to the AMH Data Center project require us to post the following downtime notice.  The my.scranton.edu portal and the Banner ERP will be unavailable on Saturday, March 5 between 7:00am and 10:00am.  The Enterprise Infrastructure team will make every effort to shorten the actual service outage but we’d like our user community to plan accordingly.


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Categories : Outages, Upgrades

E-mail Transition Planning

25 02 2011

On February 22, a few interested members of the faculty and staff met to discuss what we could do to make sure the email transition to Live@edu goes as smoothly as possible. For details about the schedule and how the transition will take place, see this post.

We haven’t decided exactly what we’ll be doing, but, with the help of IR, we would like to implement a “Pick Your Date” e-mail transition program over the summer. The idea works like this:

  • Over the summer, faculty can “opt in” to have their email switched over to Microsoft Live@edu
  • IR needs about 3 weeks notice for anyone who wants to switch prior to the week they wish to do so
  • There will be one round of transitions each week, probably occurring on a Tuesday or Wednesday. Everyone signed up for that week will be switched over simultaneously
  • There will be Tech Cons from CTLE on hand to help with getting used to the new system and/or moving email from your local folder to the cloud service
  • There will be voluntary 30 minute lunch-time presentations on a weekly basis introducing faculty to the new web-based system
  • Faculty who transition early can function as “go-to” members in their department, since they’ll have some experience with the system long before the rest of the faculty are forced to switch over

Picking the week you want to switch ensures that you can deal with the new system on your own terms, i.e., when you’re not teaching, or in the middle of a big grant proposal, or on vacation or what-have-you.

Any thoughts or preferences? Will this work? Won’t it? Let us know!


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IR Employee Recognition Program

25 02 2011

I know a lot of us have had some tough times working with computer problems, and we’ve done a fair bit of complaining about it here on this blog. But have any of you had any good experiences? Any member of IR that’s gone above and beyond the call of duty to help out and get you what you need? Now’s your chance to reward the people who you think are doing a good job over there in AMH. Check out the “Planning and Information Resources Employee Recognition Program” . Submit something about your favorite IT professional here http://matrix.scranton.edu/pir/erp.shtml . Check out the solicitation, copied below.

Planning and Information Resources Employee Recognition

Once again nominations are being sought for the Planning and Information Resources Division Employee Recognition Program.

The Employee Recognition Program provides an avenue whereby Planning and Information Resources employees’ exemplary contributions and achievements will be recognized.

This effort will support the values established by the Planning and Information Resources organization. As a division, we are committed to the on-going recognition of the achievements and contributions of our staff who are committed to the divisional values.

Three awards are given each year to the nominated employees who best exemplify and further the following fundamental values:
· A passion for our work
· An atmosphere of mutual respect, collaboration and professional respect
· A distinct customer focus
· A spirit of innovation
· An emphasis on agility

This year’s awards are based upon performance from April 2010 through March 2011. Nominations will be accepted through March 31, 2011.

Nominations may be received from any source, internal or external to the division and submitted to the awards committee, in care of the Director, IT Services or submitted electronically to http://matrix.scranton.edu/pir/erp.shtml.

The following information should be included:
(1) Nominee’s name
(2) Description of the specific contribution or action made by the nominee
(3) How the nominee’s action(s) and contribution(s) demonstrate at least one of the five values listed above
(4) Nominator’s name The nominator should give as complete a description as possible regarding what the nominee accomplished to deserve the award and how it demonstrates one or more of the Divisional Values.

If you have any questions concerning the Planning & Information Resources employee recognition program, please e-mail Desantoj1@scranton.edu.


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Categories : Announcements

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