ILTS Announcements & News

Drop-in sessions are 9am-11am. The dates noted below - all sessions in SML 510 or 512 unless otherwise noted.

Feb 1 -- Randi McCray
Feb 8 -- George Ouellette
Feb 15 -- Kerry Alles
Feb 22 -- Ernie Marinko
Feb 29 -- Meng Tang @ Kline
Feb 29 -- George Ouellette
March 7 -- Randi McCray
March 12 -- Meng Tang @ SSL
March 14 -- Ernie Marinko
March 21 -- Kerry Alles
March 28 -- Mike Friscia
*** New Sessions ***
May 9 - Mike Friscia
May 16 - Randi McCray
May 23 - George Ouellette
May 30 - Ernie Marinko
June 6 - Ernie Marinko
June 13 - Mike Friscia
June 20 - Meng Tang

I did a presentation on April 2 for LMC on WWDCS and the VRC - if interested - you can view it here .

-kk

WWDCS will begin hosting monthly round table meetings with representatives from the Expert Users Group. In an effort to increase communication with the Expert Users Group and the reverse, WWDCS welcomes you to send suggested agenda items to the Expert Users list for the meetings. Monthly notices will go out with the meeting date and meeting location and a proposed agenda. These meetings will serve as a forum for department updates, technological changes, etc. which affect the computing population within the library. All Expert Users are not required to attend, but at least one from each department is recommended. The first meeting is scheduled to take place on February 26, 2008 in SML RM 410 11:00 AM.

ITS has its own blog for announcements and news, see: http://blogs.yale.edu/roller/page/ITS .

There has been some confusion, I think, about the purpose of this blog. It was designed, as blogs can be, to be an authoritative communication vehicle out of WWDCS - it was not intended to be an interactive discussion forum. Yulexp can still be used for those more interactive discussions - or perhaps we need another unmoderated blog for that purpose.

It may be that a blog was the wrong medium to choose for this purpose given the fact that it was intended to be a one-way communication vehicle - if that is the case - we will investigate other communication vehicles and the blog will simply go away. In order to avoid confusion about the purpose - the ability to comment on this blog has been disabled.

At the same time we are looking at other ways to improve communication from WWDCS - beginning in February Randi McCray will be coordinating monthly expert user round-table meetings as a way to improve communication and encourage discussion - watch for information from Randi with dates/times, etc soon.

-kk

The call for equipment requests is going out today - January 31. Please consult with WWDCS staff for current pricing, equipment information, etc. Requests are due by February 22.

If you would like a WWDCS staff member to visit your department meeting to discuss plans for the conversion to Outlook/Exchange - we would be happy to do so. Please contact Karen Kupiec or Randi McCray to arrange a visit (beginning in February).

kk

In addition to the usual means of support - WWDCS staff will be holding drop-in sessions for staff who have questions about using Outlook. One staff member will be available from 9-11 each Friday morning at their desk in SML. (Note: sessions will be coordinated for folks in SSL/GovDocs and the Science Libraries that are closer to their locations.)

If staff have a question about using Outlook - please feel free to stop in to SML 510 or SML 512.

kk

ITS Media Services just received a 21megapixel camera that can produce 60MB files, this is camera would be appropriate for digitization of posters and other large format objects. If you have such content to be digitized - contact DPIP for help managing the process.

Here are our preliminary plans for the roll-out of Outlook -

-Staff receiving replacement workstations this spring will be converted to Outlook for e-mail during the replacement process.

-We will leave old email in Eudora and begin fresh in Outlook. This will mean staff will need to look in Eudora for old messages. Access to new email from Eudora will be discontinued (so you won't be able to look at new email in Eudora).

-Staff will receive a one-on-one training session on the basics of Outlook as their workstation is converted.

-We will offer two-hour 'Outlook Drop-In' sessions for staff weekly. There will be one two-hour session each week where staff can come and ask their Outlook questions with a WWDCS staff member. Dates and times for these sessions will be announced by the end of the week.

-We will conduct hands-on training sessions for Expert Users who did not receive Outlook training in the initial sessions last fall. Expert Users who currently do not have Outlook will be converted to it as staff in their units are converted - this training will be scheduled over the next few weeks.

-We are preparing a 'Eudora-to-Outlook' crosswalk document that will describe how to do comparable tasks in Outlook. This will be available on the WWDCS site this week as will links to additional documentation from Microsoft including how-to videos. Look for a new 'Outlook' section on the WWDCS site.

These plans are in addition to the general information sessions planned by ITS starting in February. More information on those sessions as they become available. We will also have more information on the mass conversion of all staff to Outlook as soon as we have more information on ITS's plans for account creation.

Please note - the conversion to Meeting Maker will happen at the end of this process - sometime late spring / early summer. All staff need to be converted to Outlook/Exchange before the Meeting Maker conversion happens (otherwise you won't be able to schedule meetings).

Any questions / concerns - please ask.

-kk