Tech News – Page 10

Lync Becomes Skype for Business

Beginning July 29, SMU faculty and staff who use Microsoft Lync will notice changes, like new notification tones, as Lync clients are upgraded to Skype for Business.

What does this mean for current Lync users?

If you use Skype to stay in touch with friends and family in your life away from work, you’ll appreciate the power and simplicity of Skype for Business. Within SMU’s closed system, it’s easy to find and connect with co-workers. If you’re going from Lync to Skype for Business, you’ll recognize all of the features you already used with a fresh interface, simplified controls, and new Emoticons.

Some of the new features of Skype for Business will not be available until its server application is available later this year. Until then, users will have access to the current features from Lync within the new Skype for Business interface. For a preview of what’s coming both short- and long-term, visit this link.

What You Need to Know When You Need It

We’re now communicating project news when you need it. Starting this week, we’ve begun posting articles in our blog IT Connect instead of the bi-monthly Technology News. Our weekly down-to-earth blog has details on upcoming projects, tech tips, training, and more.

Excel for Windows Tips and Shortcuts Webinar

Boosting Your Efficiency and Productivity

Offered by Lynda.com

Explore Microsoft Excel tips and shortcuts you can use every day on a Windows operating system. Join Dennis Taylor, spreadsheets expert and lynda.com author, to unlock techniques for navigating, copying and pasting, writing formulas, entering data, creating charts, and formatting.

This webinar will discuss:

Keystroke combinations
Toolbar and menu options
Cells, columns, rows
And more
Q&A session to follow.

All registrants are provided with a recording of the webinar and the slide deck after the event.

Register Now

Webinar details:

Thursday, May 21, 2015
11 a.m. to noon PT
2 to 3 p.m. ET
FREE

Speaker: Dennis Taylor

Dennis Taylor has more than 25 years of experience working with spreadsheet programs as a book and tutorial author, speaker, seminar leader, and facilitator. Since the mid-1990s, he has been the author or instructor of numerous Excel video and online courses, and has traveled throughout the US and Canada presenting more than 300 seminars and classes.

Dennis has written and co-authored multiple books on spreadsheet software, and has presented more than 500 Excel webinars. He has worked with hundreds of corporations, government agencies, colleges, and universities. He lives in Boulder, Colorado.

Summer 2015: Sneak Peek from OIT

It’s hard to believe the Spring semester is almost over. Summertime is always a very busy period for OIT as we strive to complete infrastructure projects or finish up new solutions before the Fall semester begins. Throughout the summer, we will post updates on a wide range of projects. However, here’s a sneak peek of a few of the projects scheduled:

New Mobile Application: a new mobile application is being developed to deliver content from my.SMU to your mobile device. New functionality will be deployed periodically throughout the year. Look for an announcement later this summer for application details!
Wireless Upgrades: The team will be busy upgrading over 600 wireless access points and enhancing some coverage areas that have reported issues.
Distributed Antenna System: is in phase 2. By the Fall, the remaining residence halls should have strong cellular signal for all four main carriers.
Help Desk Relocation: Yes, due to the Fondren Library renovations scheduled to begin shortly after graduation, the OIT Help Desk will be relocating. More details will be announced soon so that you’ll know where to find us when you need us!
Voicemail to Inbox: This project is featured in another post, but soon your SMU voicemail will be delivered right to your email inbox.

There are many other projects underway. Stay tuned to the blog for more details and updates!

Microsoft Forefront Replacement Coming this Month!

Microsoft is discontinuing support for and replacing Forefront, our licensed anti-virus application for SMU Windows machines, with a solution called Endpoint Protection. OIT will begin deploying this replacement product via LANDesk over the next several weeks.

About Endpoint Protection

Endpoint Protection provides anti-virus and anti-malware protection, detection and remediation capabilities. The agent runs in the background and daily scans to ensure your computer is free from malware. If malware is present, it will attempt to clean it. Machines that cannot automatically clean will appear on a report monitored by OIT. A consultant is then dispatched to remediate the malware. This new solution functions the same way as Forefront. Other than a different icon, you probably won’t notice a difference!

About the Installation

Microsoft’s System Center (the engine behind the new Microsoft Endpoint Protection) will be deployed to Windows computers running the LANDesk agent. When this happens, you can ignore a pop-up alert from Forefront indicating that new software is being installed. After System Center installs in the background, a new folder is created under “All Programs” called “Microsoft System Center 2012 R2” which you can also ignore.
As soon as Microsoft Systems Center installation is complete, Forefront will be uninstalled and Endpoint Protection will be deployed to the computer. This process will cause two alerts to pop-up on your computer screen which you can safely ignore. The first indicates that you need to update Forefront, and the second states that you need to install antivirus software. Endpoint Protection will complete shortly after the two pop-up messages appear, and you’ll see new system tray icon.

The deployment is under testing within OIT. We are scheduled to complete the test rollout on May 15. Following the successful implementation, the deployment task will be approved for all SMU Windows machines.

Former Work-At-Home User Information

If you have previously used a home download of Microsoft Forefront on your home computers, a version of Endpoint Protection will no longer be available for faculty and staff to download for home use. For a free alternative, Microsoft offers Security Essentials, which is a free home version of Forefront for Windows Vista and Windows 7. If your home computer run Windows 8, antivirus and antispyware software is built-in, so no action is required unless you prefer a paid antivirus solution.

If you have any questions, please contact the Help Desk at 214-768-4357.