DotCIO News & Announcements
Instructors Encouraged to Request Fall 2014 LMS Course Sites Now
Attention, all RPI Learning Management System (Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP12) instructors, designers, and TAs! If you are planning on having a LMS (Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP12) course site for the Fall 2014 semester, you are encouraged to request your course site now by completing a LMS course request form, providing as much detail as possible.
A couple of tips for requesting course site(s) appear below.
Scheduled Network Maintenance to Result in Brief Service Outage
Starting at 9:00pm on Thursday, July 10, DotCIO will be installing new networking hardware, which will result in a 15-minute interruption in service. The services affected by this outage include Exchange email, Windows Domain Authentication services, AirWatch Mobile Device Management, and SharePoint Services.
During this brief outage:
Lenovo ThinkPad T440s Ultrabook Selected for Fall 2014 Mobile Computing Program
Rensselaer's Mobile Computing team is pleased to announce that the 2014-2015 Mobile Computing Package, which includes a Lenovo ThinkPad T440s Ultrabook laptop computer, will be available at a purchase price of $1,620 to those incoming freshman and transfer students who will be coming to Rensselaer for the Fall 2014 semester.
Please refer to the Mobile Computing website for complete details about this great new package!
COMSOL Multiphysics Modeling Workshop Scheduled for June 20
LMS Maintenance Scheduled for May 18
Rensselaer's Learning Management System (LMS) will be unavailable from 6:00pm to midnight on Sunday, May 18 for a maintenance update.
We regret any inconvenience this outage may cause. If you have any questions regarding this notice, please contact Web Learning Consultant Theresa Sommer by phone at 276-2269, or via e-mail.
An Important Reminder Regarding Total End of Windows XP Support
Members of Rensselaer's Academic & Research Computing staff wish to remind all members of the campus community that Windows XP, which was launched on campus more than 12 years ago, has reached the total end of its support as of April 8. As a result, Microsoft no longer provides any fixes, updates or online technical assistance for the XP operating system.
Computing Community Warned about Recent "Heartbleed" Internet Bug
Software bugs do not usually get much news coverage unless they are very significant, and the latest bug now making headlines, known as Heartbleed, is very significant indeed.
The Heartbleed bug undermines the technology used by many Internet sites to secure their transactions. Sites vulnerable to the Heartbleed exploit might expose to an attacker individual user passwords or, worse, the secret encryption keys used to secure communication with the site.
VPN required for off-campus LMS access
Please note that, effective immediately, off-campus access to the LMS system requires use of the VPN service.
If a VPN client is not already on your system, download and install the VPN client. Once the VPN is installed, connect to the VPN, and then access LMS.
Voicemail System Upgrade Scheduled to Begin Saturday, April 12
The campus voicemail system will not be available from 9:00pm on Saturday, April 12 until 9:00am on Sunday, April 13 while Information Technologies Infrastructure (ITI) performs an upgrade to improve system reliability and service.
Please note that users will not be able to receive and listen to new voicemail messages during the system outage.
If you have any questions, please contact Senior Network Engineer Colleen Morrissey.
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