Technology Update - March 10, 2011

Contents:
01. Moving to Blackboard Learn: "The Drexel Roadmap"
02. Only Two Weeks Left to Register for the e-Learning 2.0 Conference!
03. Attention: Off-campus Users of Drexel DNS Service
04. Windows 7 Service Pack 1 Released
05. Important Changes to IBM SPSS (PASW) Licenses
06. About ArcGIS Licensing
07. Apple's "Find My iPhone" App
08. Accessibility Series: Windows 7 and Scaling
09. Aero Features in Windows 7: Aero Peek
10. SharePoint Alerts
11. Libraries and Folders in Windows 7 Explorer

Tips & Tricks

News & Notes from the Online Learning Team
15. Winter Term Courses Closing Soon in Bb Vista
16. Use a Supported Browser with Bb Vista
17. PeerMark Layer and Full Source Text Now Available in Turnitin
18. The Bb Vista Repository
19. Check Spelling in Bb Vista
20. Sign Up for OLT Workshops

1. Moving to Blackboard Learn: "The Drexel Roadmap"

Blackboard Learn will become the only Learning Management System (LMS) at Drexel University beginning in the summer term of 2012.

To get an overview of "the Drexel Roadmap" for the migration to Blackboard Learn, including general information and timeframes, attend one of these Brown Bag Lunch sessions:

• Friday, March 11, 12:30 p.m. – 1:30 p.m., Korman 116
• Wednesday, April 13, 12:30 p.m. – 1:30 p.m., Korman 116
• Thursday, May 12, 12:30 p.m. – 1:30 p.m., Korman 116

To register for a session, email the Online Learning Team at olt@drexel.edu.

Register today for the ninth annual e-Learning 2.0 Conference! Hosted by IRT, the conference will be held on Thursday, March 24, 2011 in Behrakis Grand Hall at the Creese Student Center. Each year, the conference draws more than 200 participants from over 35 regional institutions to share best practices for learning enrichment and student engagement in an e-learning 2.0 environment.

This year's keynote address on "Cultivating Web Accessibility" will be delivered by Jared Smith, associate director of WebAIM (http://webaim.org), who has presented extensively and provided Web accessibility training to thousands of developers throughout the world. Smith will provide an entertaining and motivating overview of Web accessibility that touches on a number of e-learning topics, including the challenges faced by students with disabilities, current trends in accessibility law, and the difficulties that confront institutions when implementing accessibility policies.

To register, visit the conference Web site at http://www.drexel.edu/irt/news/events/eLearningConf. A $20 registration fee for Drexel participants includes welcome materials, access to the presentations and keynote speaker sessions, a continental breakfast, lunch, afternoon refreshments, and a door prize drawing at the conclusion of the event (winners must be present).

The conference represents a fantastic opportunity to learn from your colleagues at Drexel and other institutions in the region. Don't miss out—register today! For questions or more information, email el2n@drexel.edu.

3. Attention: Off-campus Users of Drexel DNS Service

As of March 21, 2011, the Drexel Domain Name System servers will no longer be available for off-campus use. A small number of users may be impacted. This change will help ensure the reliability and security of Drexel's campus network.

Only those who have manually configured their off-campus computers, network, or mobile devices to use Drexel's DNS servers need to take action. If so, you should reconfigure such devices to use DNS server addresses provided by your local Internet Service Provider (ISP), such as Comcast or Verizon. To do so, remove the previously-configured DNS server IP addresses. If you have any questions or require further assistance, please contact your ISP or IRT's Help Desk at 215-895-2020 or consult@drexel.edu.

IRT supported remote-campus locations such as Camden, Malvern, and Sacramento are part of the Drexel Network and are not impacted.

4. Windows 7 Service Pack 1 Released

Service Pack 1 for Windows 7 was released on February 22. Important security and performance patches are included, as well as improvements to Windows 7 features. If your computer is set to install updates automatically, you might have noticed it rebooting after the update. If your computer is not set to update automatically, be sure to download and install this important update via Windows Update or Microsoft's Web site.

For more information or to download the update, visit http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/whats-included-in-windows-7-service-pack-1-sp1.

As a result of last year's acquisition of IBM SPSS (formerly PASW), Drexel's academic licensing options have changed. IBM is phasing out their IBM SPSS student home-use option for privately-owned computers. Although the license will be discontinued after May 31, 2011, there will be a 30-day grace period before official discontinuation on June 30, 2011. However, for less than $50, students are able to purchase SPSS Statistics from e-Academy (accessible under the "Drexel" tab in DrexelOne).

For faculty and staff, the licensing terms remain the same with one exception: Decision Trees has replaced the AnswerTree module. Decision Trees, which provides the same functionality as AnswerTree, is now available as a standalone product in our current license for IBM SPSS v. 18.

ArcGIS, an application suite designed to create geographic data, maps, globes, and models, can only be used by Drexel faculty and staff on a Drexel-owned computer. If you are a faculty or staff member and would like to use ArcGIS, please contact the IRT Help Desk at 215-895-2020 or send an email to consult@drexel.edu.

7. Apple's "Find My iPhone" App

Apple's "Find My iPhone" app is now free for iPhone 4, iPad, or 4th Generation iPod Touch users. With this app, you can locate your missing device via GPS on other iOS 4.2 devices. All you need to do is log into the device with an Apple ID and enable the app. These same steps can be followed on the other iOS 4.2 device that is being used to locate the missing device.

This app also allows users to remotely lock the misplaced device or wipe sensitive data stored on it.

For more information about this app, visit http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/find-my-iphone/id376101648?mt=8#.

While screen and resolution sizes have been increasing, text and objects on the screen have not scaled accordingly. This can make text and icons difficult to see, especially on a large screen. Older operating systems allowed users to increase the size of objects on the screen, but not always in proportion to other objects on the screen, and not uniformly in all programs or browsers.

Fortunately, Windows 7 offers a scaling feature that can size everything on your screen appropriately! To modify scaling, right-click on the desktop and select "Personalize," or go to "Control Panel" > "Appearance and Personalization." Click "Display," and then choose from a preset percentage increase, or set your own custom value by clicking "Set custom text size (DPI)" in the left-hand pane. For the best possible image quality, ensure that your screen resolution is set to the maximum resolution for your monitor.

9. Aero Features in Windows 7: Aero Peek

This is the third article in a series about Windows 7's new Aero features, a collection of visual enhancements designed to make the Windows 7 user interface simpler and more efficient.

Aero Peek is perhaps the most powerful of the new Aero features. Peek is similar to the old "Show Desktop" icon in Windows XP, but it has been moved to the lower right-hand corner of the screen. If you mouse over this area (which looks like a thin rectangle), you will see an outline of all open windows as well as any enabled desktop gadgets.

Additionally, Peek allows you to preview any minimized window in the taskbar. Simply hover over a program icon in the taskbar, and Peek will reveal a thumbnail of all open windows in that program. Can't quite make out what is in the window? Hover your mouse over one of the thumbnails, and Peek zooms in on the window while hiding all other open windows.

Peek can also show you a live preview of movies that are playing in Windows Media Player as well as open tabs in Internet Explorer (10 tabs or fewer). If you use Mozilla Firefox, Peek will show the browser's tabs as well, but depending on the version of Firefox you are using, Peek might not be enabled by default. If this is the case, follow these steps to enable Peek in Firefox:

1. In the Firefox address bar, type about:config and press the "Enter" key.
2. Accept any cautionary messages that appear.
3. In the "Filter" bar, type browser.taskbar.previews.enable.
4. In the listing that appears, double-click "browser.taskbar.previews.enable" to change the value from "false" to "true."
5. Close Firefox.

The next time you open Firefox, you will see thumbnail previews of open tabs just as you do in Internet Explorer when using the Peek feature.

If you need to know when a change has been made to your SharePoint site, you can have SharePoint notify you automatically. There are two ways to receive notifications: You can set an alert, or create an RSS feed.

Set an Alert

Alerts can send you notifications via email when changes are made to a particular item, document, list, or library. If you have permission to manage site settings, you can also set alerts for other people. To create an alert:

1. Navigate to the list or library for which you would like to set an alert.
   
   
2. Click "Actions" on the toolbar and select "Alert Me."
   
   
3. If necessary, change the title of the alert to make it more specific.
   
   
4. Enter the usernames or email addresses of alert recipients in the "Send Alerts To" box.
   
   
5. Specify if alerts should be sent when any change is made, new items are added, existing items are modified, or items are deleted. (Note: This selection will not appear if you are setting an alert for an individual item in the list or library.)
   
   
6. Specify if you want to receive an alert when anything changes, when an item is changed by someone else, when someone else changes an item that was created or modified by you, or when someone changes an item in a specific view.
   
   
7. Select how often you would like to receive the alert (immediately, or in a daily or weekly summary).

Create an RSS

Feed RSS feeds are used to publish frequent updates from Web sites and are viewable through an RSS reader in Internet Explorer or Microsoft Outlook. To create an RSS feed:

1. Navigate to the list or library for which you would like to create an RSS feed.
   
   
2. Click "Actions" on the toolbar and select "View RSS Feed."
   
   
3. Subscribe to the feed:
   
   
   1. In Internet Explorer: Click the "Subscribe to this feed" link and choose the RSS reader you want to use.
      
      
   2. In Firefox: Choose the RSS reader you want to use and click the "Subscribe Now" button.

For more information on alerts and RSS feeds in SharePoint, click here.

11. Libraries and Folders in Windows 7 Explorer

Introduced in Windows 7, two options now exist for viewing folder contents in Windows Explorer: libraries and folders. Libraries deviate from the traditional hierarchical structure of the folders view. Here are the things to know about libraries:

1. Folders located on the C: drive and other drives can be added to libraries. For instance, a folder in "C:\My Documents\Dogs\images" can be added to the "Pictures" library by selecting "Include in library" and then "Pictures" in the menu bar.
   
   
2. You can configure the default view for each library. This view will automatically apply to all folders in the library. For instance, if the "Medium Icons" view is selected, medium-sized images of photos in the library folders will be displayed.
   
   
3. The file list pane includes a library header with a single button, "Arrange by…, " with options that depend on the library and view selected. For instance, instead of arranging pictures by folder, you can arrange them by rating.
   
   
4. Default libraries include "Documents," "Pictures," "Music," and "Videos," although additional libraries can be created. For instance, you can create a library named "Tests" or "Presentations." The new library will initially contain a single button labeled "Include a folder."

If you're looking for a more customizable experience, you can still access folders directly from Windows Explorer by browsing to a drive and drilling down to a desired folder. Here are some things to know about folders:

1. Viewing options can be set (and stored!) for each folder. For instance, a bottom-level folder can be sorted by date even if its parent folder is sorted by name.
   
   
2. Shortcuts to folders (as well as to library folders) can be added to the favorites list in the left-hand folders pane to speed browsing. The favorites list can contain shortcuts both to a folder's library view and also to the non-library folder.

Let's say you want a particular sorting structure in your top-level folders and a different sorting structure in lower-level folders (e.g., you want your top-level documents folders to be sorted by name and lower-level folders to be sorted by date so that you can easily find your most recent documents). Instead of linking to the Documents Library, which would sort all folders the same way, you can simply create shortcuts directly to the documents folders that you most commonly use. This way, the folders and subfolders will "remember" how they are sorted.

Tips & Tricks are helpful articles that address a variety of Windows and Mac applications. Click on one of the links below to view the full article:

15. Winter Term Courses Closing Soon in Bb Vista

Courses in Bb Vista open on the first day of the term at midnight and close on the last day of the term at midnight. This means that students will no longer be able to access your winter term course(s) as of Saturday, March 19 at 11:59 p.m. If you would like to extend student access to your course(s), please follow the instructions posted here.

For the upcoming spring term, students will be able to access your spring term course(s) on Monday, March 21 at 12:01 a.m. To open up your course(s) early, please refer to the instructions above.

If you have any questions, please contact the Online Learning Team at olt@drexel.edu or 215-895-1224.

16. Use a Supported Browser with Bb Vista

Bb Vista should only be used with a supported browser that has been tested and certified by Blackboard. While other computer-based and mobile browsers might work with varying levels of success in Bb Vista, the Online Learning Team does not recommend using them with Bb Vista. Common supported browsers include Internet Explorer 8 and Firefox 3.6.x on Windows, and Safari 4 and Firefox 3.6.x on the Mac (Google Chrome is not a supported browser). For a full listing of supported browsers, refer to http://kb.blackboard.com/pages/viewpage.action?pageId=25368512.

If you have any questions, please contact the Online Learning Team at olt@drexel.edu or 215-895-1224.

Turnitin has recently released improvements to its interface:

1. PeerMark Layer: Students and instructors can now view PeerMark reviews within the document viewer as a layer over the original paper.
   
   
2. Full Source Text: Instructors can now see the entire text of a matching source in OriginalityCheck. Previously, when instructors clicked on a highlighted match in the paper, they saw a glimpse of the matched text, typically a sentence before and after. Now, they can click "Expand to full text" and view all of the text from the matched source to provide better context.

Learn more by watching a video about these changes on the Turnitin Web site: Click here.

18. The Bb Vista Repository

The Repository is a hierarchical storage area within Blackboard Vista that is available to instructors and designers in different courses and course sections. The Repository offers storage space at various levels, but the two most commonly used levels are institution and course.

At the institution level, material can be stored for use at the course level. For instance, a movie or document about Bb Vista or images of the campus can be stored in the institution-level Repository, and designers in any course can then link to these documents on their course pages. Faculty cannot upload to this area, but they can link to any public files placed there by institution administrators.

At the course level, materials can be stored in the Repository for use at the section level. A course coordinator or departmental administrator can be given permission to upload content to this area, so that exams or lab materials, for instance, can be accessed by section instructors. Unlike course templates, which are assigned to sections only at the beginning of a term, documents in the Repository can be used to update sections at any time.

For more information about using the Repository to share course materials in Bb Vista, please contact the Online Learning Team at olt@drexel.edu.

Although Spell Check is not available in the regular text boxes in Bb Vista, such as the one in the threaded discussion area, you can use the HTML Creator to access this feature. Simply type your post for a discussion topic and click the "Enable HTML Creator" button. Any misspelled words will automatically be underlined in red; to correct them, right-click on the word and choose from the list of suggestions that appears. You can also click the "Check Spelling" icon (ABC with a checkmark) to bring up the full spell check applet.

Additionally, some versions of the Firefox browser will highlight any misspelled words in a regular text box—even before you have enabled the HTML Creator.

20. Sign Up for OLT Workshops

The Online Learning Team conducts training sessions on Blackboard (Bb) Vista, Camtasia, DragonDrop, Dreamweaver, Mac OS X, Respondus, SharePoint, Snap, and Wimba Classroom. In addition, several brown bag lunches and workshops on technology products of interest (Microsoft Windows 7, Office 2010, PowerPoint, Turnitin, GIMP, Audacity, etc.) are held each month. These training sessions are open to members of Drexel's community as well as the general public.

To reserve a spot at any of these workshops, email us at olt@drexel.edu with your name, institution (if other than Drexel), contact information, and the name of the workshop(s) you would like to attend.

Below is a sampling of workshops taking place in March and April:

Recording and Editing with Camtasia Studio for Windows
Friday, April 15, 10:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.

Bb Vista Full Day Workshop
Wednesday, March 16, 9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.

SharePoint Basic Training
Friday, March 18, 2:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.

DragonDrop Basic Training
Tuesday, March 29, 10:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.

Visit our Web site at http://www.drexel.edu/IRT/help/workshops for our complete training schedule and workshop descriptions. Unless otherwise noted, all training sessions will be held in room 116 of the Korman Center (off the Quad on Drexel's Main Campus, 33rd Street between Market and Chestnut Streets).