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How to set the home page in your web browser

2011/08/22 Leave a comment

E.g. if you want to update your email start page from http://unccmail.uncc.edu to http://mail.uncc.edu.

in Safari, go to menu: Safari / Preferences / home page: type your updated page address in here and click OK. Visual walkthrough is e.g. here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIGocolMtzU.

Similarly in the preferences of all other common web browsers.

Categories: e-infrastructure Tags: , ,

List of LRC rooms, equipment & tutor hours that can be booked or checked out

2011/08/21 10 comments

The LRC has 98 resources (in black letters and green (NEW Winter2012) versus purple is w/o email address and booking is still paper-based; yellowis broken;red: is missing), that, per new procedure since Fall 2011 (explained in one screenshot), from NINERMAIL or MS-Outlook (Desktop), using their email address listed in column address@uncc.edu, can

  1. be booked online by sending meeting requests (all, except ccurrently tutors&LRC assistants. See column “users” for who is allowed to book).
  2. or whose schedule can be viewed (all by staff; the calendars that can be viewed/subscribed to by students are indicated by “View” below)

Note that as of Winter 2012, physical items can only be picked up and returned when the CIRCULATION window LRCCOED436 is open which is less often than the LRCAssistant is present at the RECEPTION desk. Please check both calendars (solid color = service available = good ) before booking AND (latebreaking changes) before picking up.

The following table comprises only rooms, hardware and “human resources” of the LRC. The LRC’s physical media and learning materials can be checked out using a different system.

In the table, the column “program” explains which department and study program this resource is available for (the LRC supports LCS, and film studies there in particular, and ELTI), “user” who within the study program is allowed to book the resource (teacher, students, LRC staff, including both assistants and tutors), “resource type” whether the resource is a room/office hour, or a piece of movable equipment,  “address@uncc.edu” which email address to send a meeting request to (shortform because of NINERMAIL length restriction), “display name” which searchable name you can find the email address under in NINERMAIL (includes tutors’s languages, explanation of room, camera and other equipment type), “make and model+manual field” the make and model of equipment items, including a link to the online maniual, if applciable, “calendar” a link to the publically viewable calendar of the resource, “max hours” the maximum duration a resource can be booked for (in hours, or 0 if there is no limit), and the “components” columns contain a parts list  for movable resources.

You can also filter, by clicking on the column header triangles, or enlarge (or hold CTRL and press +), or, if you are friends with the UNCC-LRC, edit.

Categories: audience-is-language-learning-center-temp-staff, audience-is-students, audience-is-teachers, e-infrastructure, faculty-equipment, film-studies-equipment, Metrics, service-is-library Tags: ,

Configuring the LRC Resource Mailboxes in MS-Exchange 2010

2011/08/21 Leave a comment

Compare the options here:

Categories: documentation, e-infrastructure Tags: , ,

How to create a zip-archive of files

2011/08/12 Leave a comment
  1. Select the files you want to zip
    • On Windows, CTRL+left-click
    • On MAC, Apple-Keyboard-Command-Key-click
  2. Access the context menu
    • On Windows, right-click
    • On MAC, control-click
  3. Zip/Compress the file:
    • On Windows, select context menu item: “Send to”/ sub menu item: “Compressed (zipped) Folder”.
    • On Mac, select  context menu item: “Compress [number of files you selected here] items”, like so:
    • archiving
  4. You can find the zip-file in the same folder where your source files are, under  the name
    • On Windows, depends on the source file names
    • On MAC, look for “Archive.zip”.
Categories: e-infrastructure Tags: , ,

Our Office 2010 & Office365/Live@Edu/Live not yet @Edu/Ninermail Upgrade: A running log

2011/08/11 1 comment
  1. Just logging some notes, observations, issues, step-by-step instructions…
  2. Office 2010ff install (office2010-full-install-labadmn.wmv [all links are to the folder only, choose screencast by name):
    1. 0:00-2:00: you can easily install Office 2010 from the ISO file without physical CD media, if you first install the free Magic Disc, then from the system notification tray, mount the ISO file to the , open the pseudo-drive from Explorer, which starts the installer through Autorun
    2. 2:00-4:00: since we do not want frozen imaged lab computers to ask for the installation media “on first run”of Office features, we choose button:customize, tab:installation options: “run all from Computer” (top – level selection is sufficient, rest of video is looking around), then button:upgrade
    3. Lots of waiting ensues…
    4. At the end, 28:55, “Microsoft office professional plus 2010 encountered and error during setup”, also the installer complains once about another instance running, then 38:12 asks for rebooting,
  3. Office 2010 first run  (office2010first-run-excel-web-app-test.wmv): 
    1. after reboot, the installation seems to have completed
    2. changing Office update policies seems to be not allowed
    3. file /save&send / save to web / windows live / log in / browse to a folder / give a filename: office2010-file-save&save-to-web 
    4. type something, save and exit
    5. in web browser, open windows live:
      1. log in, go to menu:SkyDrive, browse to the folder, find the file, click on it to view in browser,
      2. from top menu, choose edit in browser, type something, save,
      3. from top menu choose edit in excel, wait for download to open, type something, save&close,
      4. go back to web browser, open the update document from the right users (lab staff).
  4. sharing with windows live
      1. first uncc-LRC needs to make some friends:
        1. eventually, we want the staff of the uncc-LRC be able to use these online  extensions of the most common tools in our work environment, MS-Windows and MS-Office. For this, we need to wait until live@edu/ninermail  is up, so that we can invite lab staff using their @uncc.edu email  addresses
        2. for testing purposes, I have invited myself and the lab coordinator using their personal Hotmail/live addresses
      2. friends need to accept the invitation email  – and even on Hotmail/live mail, look for them in their Junk mail folder (this has been one of the unresolved mysteries of inter-office politics at Microsoft since at least 2007). accepting-friend-request
      3. second, in SkyDrive, share your files with these  friends, and with the right permissions
        1. skydrive-setting-folder-permissionsa sharing policy, per folder, needs to be decided upon
        2. uncc-non-secure permissions: all view, friends edit: uncc-lrc-non-secure-permissions
        3. uncc-secure-settings: only friends view and edit (shall we limit editing to some friends? permanent staff?) uncc-lrc-secure-permissions
        5. skydrive-permissions-folder-secure-some-friends note that some granularity of permissions is already supported, like
          1. folder:”secure”- “friends”:”can add,edit,delete”
          2. folder:”secure”- “friends”:”can read”
          3. folder:”secure”- “some friends”:”can add,edit,delete”
        6. skydrive-setting-folder-permissions-public-cannot-give-edit-access-beyond-friends note that you can give read, but not write access to files beyond the circle of your friends (“friending” within the organization should, however, become are more acceptable option when/if live@edu will allow for @uncc.edu accounts, and interesting, since it offers disintermediation for office network admin tasks).
        7. skydrive-upload-files-standard you can add files through a standard web-interface, or a more advanced Active-x control (looks like your mileage may still widely vary outside of Internet Explorer which is even more confusing when the ActiveX interface is offered in Firefox, but shows glitches). Note, however, that opening a local file in Office 2010 and save&share to SkyDrive is more attractive – however, will you in MS-Office see the folders that are merely shared with you to add to? Does not look like it. Stay tuned… office2010-file-save&save-to-web-windows-live-skydrive. one can still upload the spreadsheet from the web browser, then, also from a web browser, click “open in excel”. From then on, one can open it ore easily from the excel File / history shortcut. I am still working on figuring out how to map SkyDrive folders to local drives (it worked for one set, but other mappings run into problems: Is this because MS allows only one windows live identity to be mapped to your local windows account?)
        8. To publish (possible embed in a web page) spreadsheets with Excel Web App, you can choose:
          1. SkyDrive menu: add files
            1. add an existing file
          2. or SkyDrive menu: “new”
          1. Excel web app ribbon menu: “Open in Excel”
          2. Copy/Paste your content and Save, Close
          3. Excel Web app menu “excel-web-app-menu-embed Share”/ “Embed”:i
          4. Adjust your options in this sharing dialog: excel-web-app-share-embed-options
          5. To embed, take the html-code (you can increase the max width beyond 640 outside of this dialog) and paste it into your web publishing program
          6. Gotcha: To be embeddable, the spreadsheet needs to be in a public folder, or else: excel-web-app-gotcha-public-folder
            1. To move the file, use the “move”option in the file details pane to the right: excel-web-app-gotcha-public-folder4-file-details
            2. This setting should  make it work: excel-web-app-gotcha-public-folder-workaround
            3. And interestingly, it does, automagically: You do not have to update the embed code. It seems the link within the embed code goes to a “file” which has the “folder” it is in not as a path (in the link), but as an attribute:excel-web-app-gotcha-public-folder3
        9. to share a file: Examples for MS-office live file collaboration
          1. MS-Excel
            1. Do not use the “embed” link from SkyDrive, e.g. https://r.office.Microsoft.com/r/rlidExcelEmbed?su=10634757809471938&Fi=SD25C841818181C2!133: this opens in read-only even if I am logged in (in Firefox and in Excel)( as a friend with editing rights)
            2. use the “edit” link from SkyDrive, e.g https://skydrive.live.com/edit.aspx?cid=0025C841818181C2&resid=25C841818181C2%21133: “edit in browser” attempts first opening in browser (Firefox – not asking for  permissions, since I am logged in as friend with editing permissions), unsupported features redirect to excel 2010, opening in “protected view“ – but can enable editing.
            3. Note that when opening in excel 2010, you lose the concurrency that excel web app offers – thus, only 1 LRC assistant can have the online spreadsheet open to make update to the film collection (we have one barcode scanner equipped PC only anyway, so use this one for editing the film-collection.xlsx)
          2. MS-PowerPoint
              1. here is a folder link from where you can click on ""open in PowerPoint":
                https://skydrive.live.com/redir.aspx?cid=0025c841818181c2&resid=25C841818181C2!115
              2. this may take time: open-in-powerpoint-2010-from-skydrive
              3. here is the ""edit in browser"" link  https://skydrive.live.com/edit.aspxcid=0025C841818181C2&resid=25C841818181C2%21146
        10. to delete a file on SkyDrive: skydrive-delete-file 
          1. in detail view, hover over the file row
          2. click on the blue info button at the right end of the file row
          3. in the property pane that opens up on the right, click “delete”.
        11. MS-Word
          1. Just in case you were wondering about the underlying WEBDAV: You cannot paste the “open in word” link into a MS-Word 2010 file open dialogue (you used to be able to paste WebDAV links form the Blackboard Content System into MS-Word’s File-Open, but those were fully qualified URIs to MS-Word-files without JavaScript trickery), or else:
          2. could-not-open
        12. As of 9/27/2011, I also now managed to get in to SkyDrive with my university credentials, for how, see here: Skydrive@uncc.edu
  5. Natural language features testing in MS-Office 2010 is being logged here.
Categories: audience-is-language-learning-center-staff, documentation, e-infrastructure, office-software, Screencasts Tags: , , ,

Multi-monitor setups

2011/08/09 Leave a comment

Bill Gates has been quoted not too long ago praising his IT staff for equipping him with a “three screens, synchronized to form a single desktop” office computer.

Multi-monitor user interfaces are increasingly deemed useful, if not necessary, to handle the richer data flows created by computers (The following slideshow contains samples of such systems I have collected over recent years, not a few are from Language centers).

Categories: audience-is-teachers, e-infrastructure Tags:

Calendaring: How to use your Moodle course calendars to keep your students up to date

2011/08/05 Leave a comment
  1. UPDATE: this now stopped working here. Clicking on the link from IE9, using “open with”: MS-Outlook 2010 fails with “the requested information store could not be found in the active profile”. I have not found a way to feed the Moodle ical link manually into MS-Outlook 2010 (Shared Calendars / Add Calendar / From Internet) or OWA different problem). Stay tuned…
  2.  Easy if you use standard Moodle assignments: “Adding closing dates to course activities — assignments, quizzes etc. will cause them to show up in the calendar block as course events. “
  3. Other assignments you have to add manually, like so:
  4. calendar-view
  5. new-event
  6. Resulting in this:  new-event-result1or this:
  7. new-event-result
  8. Editing your calendar in other applications and importing, even synching it with Moodle is not currently (2.1) supported.
  9. More on Calendar you can find in the official 1.9 Moodle calendar doc and FAQ.
Categories: audience-is-teachers, e-infrastructure Tags: ,

How to disable or rather bypass the Popup Blocker in your Web browser

2011/08/04 Leave a comment

Try pressing the CTRL-key when clicking a link that tries to open a popup window.

This is a known problem with web-based learning applications like Moodle or library ereserves (like UNCCC’s Docutek ERes-based one) .

You can permanently disable popup blockers for certain sites if you study the documentation that comes with your browser (and possibly with the shared computer) you are working on.

Categories: e-infrastructure, websites Tags: , , ,