The ArtsIT F1 - Issue 1 November 2005
- Tim's Thing
- ArtsSystems - Leasing within the Faculty of Arts
- ArtsHelp - Requesting IT Support
- ArtsWeb - Packing a Bag - Pack Your Bookmarks
- ArtsSecurity - Passwords & Access
- ArtsDB - Procedures and the AUQA
- ArtsTraining
Tim's Thing
Tim McLaughlan
Welcome to this, the first edition of ArtsIT F1. I'm pretty happy with the way this first edition looks, but I reckon we can only get better as we move forward. (your mileage may vary).
I'm guessing you may have some questions but. (affected bad grammar, hey, I'm a child of the 60's), so I'm gonna try and pre-empt as many as I can.
Why F1?
On most computers, hitting F1 will call the Windows Help System to help you with what you're trying to do. That's exactly what ArtsIT F1 is also trying to do, helping you to get your job done within the Faculty in your everyday life with minimal pain.
Each of the ArtsIT Section Leaders will write, each edition, on a subject that they think may interest or help you. Sometimes these articles may be boring, technical, interesting, funny or inspiring. We're not really sure where ArtsIT F1 is gonna go but we reckon that we're gonna persevere until mid next year and monitor feedback to try and get it into a space that helps you get your job done in the best way we possibly can. If it works, we'll keep going.
Why paper?
My belief, which may be horribly flawed, is that we still have some folks in the Faculty that are not as computer literate as others. (which is fine by me, if it works for them (no, seriously)). With a paper based newsletter, quite frankly, you can easily take it home, take it to the bathroom or give it to your friends or associates or work colleagues (without one of those newfangled whiz-bang USB /Thumb drives that are becoming so prevalent).
What is F1?
What we in ArtsIT are trying to do was mentioned above briefly but maybe I should go into more detail. We do a whole mess of stuff for different purposes for different people that may well be useful to other areas of the Faculty. Ian will talk to issues affecting connectivity and communications; Johnathon will talk about why your computer is the way that it is; Anthony will give you some advice about tech-stuff you should watch out for; Ron is gonna have some handy tech-tips; The Helpsters (ArtsIT Help desk) should have some handy tips; The ArtsWeb Team should have some good advice on web issues; And Stuart and the training gang should have some tips on how you can work smarter. And the rest of the gang may well come up with some interesting stuff (which I probably don't know what it is) (which is the benefit of having fantastic staff, they surprise me all the time).
Distribution & Feedback.
What we are currently planning to
do is distribute ArtsIT
F1 on paper to all Arts Staff (no matter where they are), Senior
ITS
Managers and other Faculty IT
Managers as a PDF
document and make it available on our web site at:
http://www.arts.monash.edu.au/artsit/
If anyone has any questions, comments or concerns please let me know or contact us at f1@arts.monash.edu.au
Thanks, Tim
ArtsSystems - Leasing within the Faculty of Arts
Johnathon Blythe
Why Does the Faculty Lease ITS PC's?
Recently when installing new computers for staff members I have often been asked why the computer they use is being replaced. I hope the following information helps to explain why and how desktop PC 's get replaced.
In June 2000 the Faculty decided that it would start to lease Desktop Computers. There were several reasons for this. From an IT point of view one of the main reasons was that the Desktop PC 's in the Faculty were quite old (some PC's had been in the Faculty for up to 7 years) and this meant they were costly to maintain. Some 5 years down the track over 95% of the Faculty's desktop computers are leased, meaning that over 95% of the Fleet are less than 4 years old. Over the 5 years ArtsIT have managed to spread the lease of our desktop fleet, so that about 250 computers are replaced each year. On average we replace approximately 20 computers each month.
The standard lease for a Windows Desktop in the Faculty is 4 years, while for an Apple Desktop it is 3 years (Apple does not provide a 4 year warranty, so we are unable to lease them for 4 years). The specifications of our standard Desktop PC are always selected to make sure that the PC has a useful working life of at least 4 years (if not more). ArtsIT sets the specifications of a standard PC to meet the needs of approximately 95% of staff. If you have requirements for a more powerful PC , then you can make a request for upgrades to the standard PC when you are informed that the PC you use is being replaced. Please note that all costs of upgrades are paid up front by either the School or from your teaching/ research funds.
How will you be notified when a computer is being replaced?
Your school will be notified at least 2 months before. The notification goes to the staff member responsible for procurement in the school (or a staff member that has been appointed by the school). They are then responsible for informing affected staff of the up coming replacement. If you want to upgrade from the standard, please let them know - they will have a list of costs for some of the standard upgrades that staff members may need.
When ArtsIT have been able to confirm all requirements for that months installations, we will order the computers. At this time we will also book an installation time in your Monash University calendar - you will also receive an email. Where possible you will be given a minimum of one months notice. Where a computer is shared by several staff members we will endeavour to let everyone know the installation date. Please note that unless absolutely necessary the installation date will not be changed.
What should you do before the day of the installation?
Please inform the ArtsIT staff member who is doing the installation, of any non standard software that you have on the PC . ArtsIT encourage you to backup your files (word documents, excel spread sheets, etc.). It would also help if you remove any post-it notes and other items that you may have placed on the PC. Where possible please leave plenty of space around the PC .
What will happen on the day of installation?
The computer will not be available for up to 2 hours. You do not need to be in your office during the installation. All your personal data (email profile, word documents, program settings - where possible, etc.) will be transferred to the new computer. The old computer will be taken away and stored for a minimum of 5 working days. Any time after 5 working days it will be returned to the company that we lease computers from. Once the computer leaves the University it is impossible to retrieve any data from it.
Artshelp - Requesting IT Support
John Tan
We thought we'd take this opportunity to tell you a little bit about our call logging system, HEAT. We're particularly pleased with the functionality and flexibility offered by HEAT as a call logging system, and are continually working to improve and expand its potential to better serve the needs of the faculty.
As many of you will be aware, a request logged in HEAT will automatically notify the staff member that their call has been logged. Similarly, when any HEAT request is closed the staff member is automatically notified - it is in fact not possible for a call to be closed without sending this notification. This has been a great advantage in helping to ensure that job requests remain visible until completed.
We'd like then to remind people that they should receive a job number for any request that they raise with ArtsIT. A great way to ensure that a job number is allocated is to send the initial request to the Helpdesk (via email, phone, or in person). We can then log the request, and assign the task to the relevant member(s) of staff. If for some reason you do not receive an allocated job number for your request, please contact the Helpdesk so that we can provide you with one.
HEAT also allows any of our staff to check the status of any logged job, regardless of who is actually working on the job, and whether or not that person is in their office at the time. So if you need an update on an open request, you need only contact the Helpdesk with the job request number and we can give you the current status of the job in question.
ArtsWeb - Packing a Bag - Pack Your Bookmarks
Peter Stagg
If you're like me you have hundreds of important web pages book-marked that you simply can't live without. More likely then not they are all on one machine. So what do you do if you have more than one machine? Or if you travel a lot and rely on Internet cafes or hotel computers to get your work done? What you need is somewhere to put your bookmarks where they will always be available when you are on the Internet. The solution - put them on the Internet.
There are several very useful free online services today where you can park your bookmarks and access them from any computer in the world. Not only can you gather your bookmarks in one handy centralised location but you can also use these services to share your bookmarks with colleagues and friends and even use them for collaborative work.
Possibly the most widely known service of this type is Furl . Furl doesn't actually save bookmarks per se but rather saves a copy of the page you want to remember. This allows you to search through all the pages you've saved so you can easily find that article on Modern Highland Mayan Ceremonialism you remembered reading three months ago.
The site I could not do without though is Spurl. I have all my bookmarks on this service. It allows you to start by uploading all your existing bookmarks via a web interface. Then there is software available for just about every browser / operating system. The software allows you to use the service just like you would your ordinary bookmarks. Don't worry about losing your bookmarks because Spurl allows you to download them as a standard bookmark file for safekeeping.
ArtsSecurity - Passwords & Access
Anthony Richardson
Passwords are the most common mechanism for authentication and authorisation, and the appropriate selection and use of passwords is critical to ensure a high level of access control and security. Staff should at all times:
- keep passwords secret - from work colleagues, staff, students and relatives
- avoid paper records of passwords
- select
quality passwords - for advice, see:
http://www.its.monash.edu.au/security/passwords/goodpassword.html
Any IT system that staff access should be physically secured during periods where they are unattended, and non-Monash staff and personnel should never be given access to IT systems. Ideally, users should log out of current sessions where the computer is going to be unattended for any period of time, and where this is not possible appropriate security measures to protect the PC from physical access should be taken (lock your office).
Staff with accounts that have been granted additional privileges, (SAP, Callista etc.) need to be especially careful that they take appropriate measures to secure their workstations.
Tip
To lock your Windows XP* workstation
hold down the Windows key 
and 
This will require you to enter your password
to unlock the workstation. This is not something you should do on
a computer that is used by more than one person - in that case always
log out or shut down. Alternatively you may find that Johnathon has
conveniently placed a shortcut on your taskbar to lock your computer:
* If you're using Windows 2000 hold down CTRL + ALT + DEL simultaneously then press ENTER.
N.B. To unlock your computer: If the screen is blank or shows the screen saver, move the mouse or press the space bar. This should wake the machine up and the Novell log-in screen should appear - log into the computer as per normal.
Artsdb - Procedures and the AUQA
Ron King
Most staff may be aware that the university is introducing a Quality Assurance Audit beginning in 2006. The Quality Assurance Audit applies to the university as a whole rather than individuals. None the less each individual, in their area of work, contributes to the overall operation of the university. With that in mind developing systems or work procedures that can be documented and self reviewed for improvement will help in ensuring that your work methods contribute to and reflect the quality improvement and audit process.
How can this be done? And remember this would apply only to work methods that you have developed rather than university defined ones. The simplest way is to (a) type in the steps that you take from start to finish to do a particular task. (b) With each step check that it is a distinct action (c) that it is important to do and what resources/people are needed for it. And (d) use your recorded procedure to check it works and the result is what is expected.
Create a Procedure (in D: drive) folder and save each procedure document with a name that easily identifies what it for. In time you may wish to transfer your procedure to a flowchart using Microsoft Visio© which is licensed to Monash. ArtsIT can help with becoming familiar with this application. The benefit of flowcharts is that they present an easy to follow standardized series of symbols as a means of following a work procedure. You can put in such things as logical decision points and also save your flowchart as a JPG or GIF file or as a HTML document (with hyperlinks if needed) that can be shared by accessing it by web browser. In this way you will establish a consistent and standardized way of doing tasks to which the university required AUQA quality improvement cycle of Plan-Act-Evaluate-Improve can be applied.
ArtsTraining
Stuart Lees
New Training Initiatives
I have been looking at delivery methods for IT courses for a few years now, and have decided to dust off one idea from when I first joined the Arts team back in 2001. At the time I was looking at the various methods of delivering just-in-time training directly via computer. Around the same time, Monash rolled out what was then known as WebCT , and it seemed to be quite an interesting way of packaging up my training for on-line delivery.
Back to the present day, and what I have been working on recently, is producing small (less than 5 minute) videos which demonstrate the actual steps required to complete different tasks in a program, such as Thunderbird (the current email program). What you will see, is a video that shows you the program, and you get to watch the mouse as it clicks on the various menus etc. to complete the task, accompanied by pop-up descriptions of what is happening.
The first few 'videos' will be made available during November, and are on topics such as "blocking spam", dealing with the "you are over quota" message that ITS love sending out for our email quota, and how to use some of the other new tools in Thunderbird. I will send out an email giving instructions at how to access these new videos when they become available.
If there are any particular topics you would like to see covered, please forward these to the ArtsIT Helpdesk.
Tip of the Month
As I am sure you are aware, the headings for each column in Thunderbird (and Communicator) are also buttons that you can click to re-sort your emails.
What you may not be aware of, is the columns that are provided by default, are not the only ones available.
Click on this button at the far-right of the list of columns, and a drop down menu will appear of all the columns that are available. Click on any that you want to use (and you can also uncheck any that are not useful). Personally, I would suggest that the "Size" and "Junk Status" columns are particularly useful.