IT Services

IT Service Desk over Easter

During the Easter holiday weekend from Thursday 28th March to Tuesday 2nd April the Service Desk will be closed. Services will be monitored remotely, and staff will endeavour to attend in the event of a major failure.

Workstation rooms 413 and 536 will be open throughout the Easter period.

Workstation room 109 will be accessible from the Library until Sunday 21 April.

Library opening times available here: http://www.bbk.ac.uk/lib/news/easter-opening-hours

ITS and Library Student Survey

Calling all Birkbeck students,

IT Services and the Birkbeck Library are conducting a web-based combined student survey. We want to hear your views, and you can win John Lewis vouchers.

http://www.bbk.ac.uk/mybirkbeck/survey_lib_it/survey.html

Please submit your survey by Tuesday 2nd April 2013 to be eligible for entry into the prize draw.

First Prize: £100 in John Lewis vouchers

Second Prize: £50 in John Lewis vouchers

Two further prizes of £25 in John Lewis vouchers

This survey is a chance for you to tell us about your use of the ITS and Library facilities and services, how important they are to you and how satisfied you are with the existing provision. Your feedback is important to us in addressing any shortcomings and helps us to improve what we provide to you.

The results of this survey will be reported to the Library Advisory Group and the IT Advisory Group.

Our thanks to all who took part in our surveys last year; we would like to hear from you again.

If you would like more information please contact the User Support Manager: n.buckle@bbk.ac.uk

Sevices over Christmas

IT Services over Christmas

The IT Service Desk will be closed from 12:30 until 15:30 on Thursday 20th December.

We will also close at noon on Friday 21st December, and remain closed during the holidays, re-opening at 9:00 on Wednesday 2nd January.

The 24 hour PC workstation room, MB413, will remain open.

During the closure period, systems will run unattended but staff will monitor systems and respond in the event of a major failure.

SPSS Licence Codes 2012/13

SPSS Licence Codes until 31st July 2013

The latest SPSS Licence Codes and instructions for updating them in your installation are available (you will need your ITS username to access them).

Please note this is the last year we will have codes for versions of SPSS older than 18, after this year you will need to upgrade to continue to use SPSS.

ITS and Library Student Survey

Calling all Birkbeck students,

IT Services and the Birkbeck Library are conducting a web-based combined student survey. We want to hear your views, and you can win John Lewis vouchers.

http://www.bbk.ac.uk/mybirkbeck/survey_lib_it/survey.html

Please submit your survey by Monday 2nd April 2012 to be eligible for entry into the prize draw.

First Prize: £100 in John Lewis vouchers

Second Prize: £50 in John Lewis vouchers

Two further prizes of £25 in John Lewis vouchers

The results of this survey will be reported to the Library Advisory Group and the IT Advisory Group.

Our thanks to all who took part in our surveys last year; we would like to hear from you again.

If you would like more information please contact the User Support Manager: n.buckle@bbk.ac.uk

Changes taking place to PCs in teaching rooms - December 2011

Important changes taking place to PCs in teaching rooms - December 2011

PCs in teaching rooms are being upgraded to Windows 7 and Office 2010.

This affects all centrally allocated teaching rooms.

The upgrades will take place from 20th December, depending on availability of the rooms.

When you first login to a Windows 7 PC, you may notice minor differences, but all applications should be available. However, your user “profile” will be renewed – see below.

How will the new desktop affect continuing students and other users?

Your favourites will be copied from the old profile to the new Windows 7 profile.
Any files on the old profile (normally those left on the desktop) will be copied to a directory called N:xp_desktop.
Note that if you work between the two systems, changes made on the old Windows XP desktop will continue to be copied across.

If you have not used Windows 7 before and would like to test applications, you can do this at any time in one of the ITS PC workstation rooms in Gordon Square or the Main Building, or in the Library.

For any queries, please contact the ITS Service Desk, ground floor Main Building, its@bbk.ac.uk.

Important changes taking place in PC workstation rooms

Important changes taking place in PC workstation rooms – September 2011

PC workstation rooms are being upgraded to Windows 7 and Office 2010.

This affects rooms where the equipment is managed by IT Services: MB413, MB422, MB423, MB412, (Main Building), GSqG10, GSqG11 (Gordon Square), Library student PCs and a new room MB109 being established.

New versions of other applications are also being installed where requested and where licensing permits.

Upgrades to workstation rooms will take place between 12th and 25th September, with the exception of GSq11, which will be upgraded 1st October (due to class commitments).

During the upgrades, which will take place room by room, PCs will not be available, so please monitor the workstation room booking timetables and service news from the ITS web site. When you first login to a Windows 7 PC, you may notice minor differences, but all applications should be available. However, your user “profile” will be renewed – see below.

A new room, MB109, will be available from the beginning of term.

Please note that rooms MB402 and CloreG03 are being removed from service.

In MB 536 we are planning to pilot a thin client version of the student workstation room desktop from the beginning of term, with a subset of applications. Depending on class bookings, a decision on this room may not be possible until the end of September

How will the new desktop affect continuing students and other users?

Your favourites will be copied from the old profile to the new Windows 7 profile.

Any files on the old profile (normally those left on the desktop) will be copied to a directory called N:\xp_desktop.

Note that if you work between the two systems, changes made on the old Windows XP desktop will continue to be copied across.

ITS and Library Student Survey

Calling all Birkbeck students,

IT Services and the Birkbeck Library are conducting a web-based combined student survey. We want to hear your views, and you can win £100 in John Lewis vouchers.

http://www.bbk.ac.uk/mybirkbeck/survey_lib_it

Please submit your survey before 13th June 2011 to be eligible for entry into the prize draw.

First Prize: £100 in John Lewis vouchers

Second Prize: £50 in John Lewis vouchers

Two further prizes of £25 in John Lewis vouchers

The results of this survey will be reported to the Library Advisory Group and the IT Advisory Group.

Our thanks to all who took part in our surveys last year; we would like to hear from you again. A summary of the results of these are available from the survey page.

If you would like more information please contact the User Support Manager: n.buckle@bbk.ac.uk

Closure of the webmail service

Using the Birkbeck GMail service and closure of the Webmail service

Continuing students using the Webmail service for electronic mail, who wish to continuing using a Birkbeck mailbox, should migrate to the new service based on Gmail, provided by Google.

Moving to the new service is straightforward, and you should first check that you have access to the new service, before informing us to amend email routing so that any new messages are delivered to the new mailbox. If you would like to copy your old messages across, this is straightforward, and instructions are available to do that.

Details of the new service are available on the ITS web site.

SPSS available for download

SPSS v18 is available for download

You can download SPSS v18 (Mac or PC) from www.bbk.ac.uk/its/spss.

Please note only staff and students can download the software (your username and password is required) and you will need the licence codes available from www.bbk.ac.uk/its/help/software/downloads/spss_codes.

You can also download the recommended patch and hotfix for SPSS v18 from http://www.bbk.ac.uk/its/help/software/downloads/SPSS_18_Patches.

Student email services using Google

Student email services at Birkbeck

Google has been adopted as the provider for the hosted student email service to replace Birkbeck's in house student webmail service. For students starting in 2010, a Google Apps account is created automatically, and those students wishing to use the service as their default mail service for College communications can change their contact email address preferences via MyBirkbeck. For continuing students and others using Birkbeck's services, Google accounts will be created during the Autumn Term, allowing the transfer of email if required, before the in house service is withdrawn in January 2011.

The default format for email address is <username>@mail.bbk.ac.uk. <username>@students.bbk.ac.uk will continue to work.

While no restriction has been placed on the use of other GoogleApps at present, only the mail service is supported. Further development is expected during 2011.

Future of the student webmail service

Future of the Student Webmail service

The systems used to provide Birkbeck’s student webmail service are coming to the end of their useful life and are due for replacement by 2011.

The webmail service has been in place for 5 years, and is offering web based access to student email, along with access via POP and IMAP email clients. By no means all students use the service – students may use the mail service of their choice as long as they maintain their contact details within the “My Birkbeck Profile”. A number of staff also use the service in preference to the recommended staff email service based upon Microsoft Exchange.

In common with many Higher Education institutions, we are expecting to take advantage of the hosted email services provided by Google or Microsoft Live. Both are offering hosted email solutions as part of a suite of applications provided free to Higher Education. Some key points about the services are:

The services *are* free, with only development and support costs to be borne by the institution.
There is no advertising to enrolled students.
Birkbeck email addresses are used, and the service remains a Birkbeck service.
POP and IMAP can continue to be supported, along with off-line working.
Mailbox sizes are far in excess of anything which could be offered locally (currently around 7Gb).
Other applications are readily available (on line document authoring, calendars, filestore, collaborative tools).
The services are subject to continued development and improvement.

We are currently examining the technical merits of the offerings, as well as privacy issues and legal implications. A message inviting comment has been sent to the students, staff and others who use the service regularly, to both inform students of the proposed changes and invite comments. We would like to hear from people who have used GoogleMail/GoogleApps or Microsoft Live and what you like or dislike about these services. Please send any comments to Dave Willcox, Infrastructure Manager (d.willcox@bbk.ac.uk).

Some comments and questions have been received already. Where questions or comments may be of interest to others, these are available in the summary of questions.

Easter Vacation 2010

ITS Help Desk will close at 6pm on Wednesday 31 March 2010, re-opening at 9am on Wednesday, 7 April 2010

Although services will run unattended during this period, Systems Team staff will monitor systems periodically, and respond in the event of major failure.

ITS Student Satisfaction Survey

Calling all Birkbeck students

Complete our on-line student survey and win a book token

Please take a few minutes to fill in fill in the ITS Student Satisfaction Survey 2010 and get the chance to win a £50 or £25 book token (closing date Sunday March 28th 2010), located here:

http://intra.bbk.ac.uk/its/survey.html

The survey is a chance for you to tell us about your use of ITS facilities (including workstation rooms) and services, how important these are to you, and how satisfied you are with the existing provision. Your feedback is important to us in addressing any shortcomings and developing our services. The results of this survey will be reported to the IT Advisory Group (ITAG).

A summary of last year's survey results is available on the survey page.

If you would like more information please contact the User Support Manager: n.buckle@bbk.ac.uk

Thank you in advance for your help.

Workstation Room Closure

Workstation Room Closures

Rooms 321 and 402 are closed.

The other workstation rooms are available:

Main Building, 458, 536
Clore: G03
Gordon Square: G10, G11
Senate House North Block: B43

Further details at http://www.bbk.ac.uk/its/services/rooms/room_locations

Apologies for any inconvenience this causes