Welcome

Welcome to the Academic ITS web site.  Here you will find helpful tips, announcements, and links to various resources to assist in the effective use of technology at Colby. We update information here regularly so check back often or Subscribe.

Learn more about our group and the services we support.

Academic ITS supported web services and aggregate use for the 2011-2012 academic year

Academic ITS support three main web platforms for faculty and students. They are the Moodle course management system, the Confluence enterprise wiki, and the WordPress web publishing platform. Each platform has its own strengths and specializations and there are significant overlaps between them in some areas. Following is a description of each service and some aggregate usage statistics for the 2011-2012 academic year.

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Using Colby Apps: Google Drive is Coming to Docs

Soon you will notice a change when you visit Colby Apps Docs.  Google is updating the service to include a new feature called “Google Drive.” 

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Using Colby Apps: Move Chat List and Label Before Send

This week I thought I would treat you to two Colby Apps E-mail tricks!

  • Moving the Chat List
  • Label Message Before Sending

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Creating a PDF

Portable Document Format (PDF) files are great because they act as electronic versions of printed pages but with several benefits over traditional paper copies:

  • They are a much greeneroption
    • No paper required
    • No need to power on a printer or heat up a fuser
    • No need for toner
    • No reprinting pages that have mistakes
  • As the name implies they tend to be small enough to be easily transferred via e-mail or on a USB thumbdrive
  • They are viewable on almost any electronic device (from computers to smart phones to tablets)

So, how do you create a PDF? [Read more...]

Using Colby Apps: Manage Web History Service

Google’s Web History service may offer more relevant search results and recommendations across Google’s products and services should you choose to allow Google to save and use your web search activity for this purpose.

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General Computer Maintenance: Data Storage

How you organize the data on your computer can be very important and warrants special attention. The two big reasons for this are: 1) it can impact your computer’s performance and 2) where you keep the data on your computer can determine if your data is being backed up or not. Here are some general tips for organizing the data on your computer.

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General Computer Maintenance: Power Management

One of the biggest headaches of using a laptop is how frequently you have to plug it in to charge it. Here are some helpful tips for getting the most out of your battery between trips to the wall outlet.

Note: While these tips are mostly geared towards laptop users, some can also be applied to desktop users that want to be more green and consume less power.

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General Computer Maintenance: Memory Issues

How many times have you said to yourself My computer has slowed down! or asked Why do I keep getting this hourglass/spinning wheel? Here are some memory management tips to keep your computer running up to speed.

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New Google Apps services accessible using Colby Apps accounts

Three new services on our Google Apps for Education domain can now be used with Colby Apps (you@colby.edu) accounts:

  1. YouTube
  2. Maps
  3. Moderator
Important: If your Colby account is closed due to graduation, transferring, getting a different job, retiring, etc., the data you put in these services will no longer be available to you. Plan to download any data you wish to keep before you leave the College. For more information on downloading your data please visit Google’s Data Liberation website.

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Colby Apps Calendar – Collapse Off Hours

How many people start work at 1 a.m.? How about work until 11 p.m.? My guess is not many. So why does your Colby Apps Calendar show those times? Well, now you can collapse those hours so they take up almost no room on your calendar. Here’s how:
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