OCTOBER, 2005

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Communicating with students via email listservs

Since most students live part of their lives online, it makes sense to use email technology to keep in touch with them.  It is a great way to make announcements, send them reminders and generally extend the classroom boundaries.  Creating and maintaining lists of email messages can be tedious, and a better solution is the automated listserv process now offered by Computer Services.  A listserv is a machine that keeps track of these email address lists and acts a lot like a subscription to a newspaper - any message posted to the listserv is received by anybody on the list.

The nicest feature of course listservs is that the lists are automatically assembled and maintained based on your course enrollments.  They are also one-way lists; you can post to these lists but students cannot reply to the entire list unless you change a setting to permit it.

Here is how to set up and manage listservs:

1. Using Internet Explorer or Firefox, log into the College’s Web services page at: http://facultyservices.oneonta.edu. Your login requires a PIN number that you can get from the Registrar's office if need be. You need to visit the Registrar in person with your picture ID to get your PIN number; they are located on the first floor of Netzer Administration Building. 
2. Click on the Faculty & Advisors link, read the FERPA statement and click “I agree.”
3. Select either Detail Class List or Summary Class List.
4. Select the term and course – Please note; the ability to create or send to a class listserv will be disabled 4 weeks after the end of a term.
5. At the bottom of the class list page is a link that says Email class; click on this link.
6. A message will come up prompting you to create the listserv. Click on the Create Listserv button.
7. You will receive a message back that the listserv has been created. There will also be instructions on how to use this list along with its name. Print these instructions or save them for future reference.

Setting up a listserv is one of many technologies that can help you communicate with students in courses. For other methods or additional assistance, contact the TLTC at x2684.
 

Outlook Tips - Message Options

Outlook offers a series of optional settings that can be set up for individual email messages that you send out.  These options provide additional capabilities that you may find useful from time to time.  When composing a message, click on the Options button. 

The Message settings drop-down menus allow you to set flags for each message in terms of the message's importance and sensitivity.  The fact of the matter is that few people pay much attention to these flags, so let's skip to Security Settings.

Security Settings allow users to encrypt messages that are particularly important.  These settings require the possession of a digital security certificate.  See this page for a (believe it or not, simplified)discussion of certificates and what they can be used for.

The Voting Buttons can be useful if you are asking a question of a group of other people.  If, for example, you add Yes/No/Maybe buttons to a message, recipients will get your message with those buttons added to the top.  If they click on a button, they will shoot a message back to you with that response in the subject line.

A delivery receipt will generate messages back to you which will verify that your message was received by the mail server at the other end.  The read receipt will ask the recipient to permit a message to go back to you as soon as he opens it for reading.  This is voluntary, but can be useful if you need to know the exact time a recipient opens a message.

Delivery options are among the most useful options.  You can have replies to a message sent to people other than yourself.  This is handy if you are sending a message on behalf of other people.  The Do Not Deliver Before option is known as deferred delivery - you can specify that a message will not actually go out until a defined time.  This is useful for messages that act as reminders, since you can put a message out to a recipient while you are on vacation, for example.

The message expiry is handy for messages that you would like to have disappear if it isn't read by a certain time.  Expiries only function for mail sent to other Oneonta email recipients.

Google Tips

Google is the most widely-used search engine on the net, but there are quite a few lesser-known functions available in Google besides straightforward searching.  For example -

Social Engineering - a way of breaking information security

We work very hard, as do most IT departments, to ensure the security of our systems; we have a serious responsibility to protect information about our students and employees.  However, there is a part of the information technology system that is left unprotected - the user.  Just as hackers spend lots of time and energy trying to break into our computer systems, there are others who use "social engineering" to try to break into the trust relationships established between people.  Like con artists, they try to convince you to do something that gives them access to the information in your possession.

Their tactics vary in sophistication.

What would you do -

• if you got a phone call from someone identifying themselves as a network administrator and asking for your password to verify connectivity?
• if an electrician you haven't seen before asked you to let him into a wiring closet because his keys were back in his office?
• if you were approached by a vending machine repairman who asked to use your computer to check his email for an important message from his boss so he wouldn't get in trouble?
• if you had a service technician from an outside company working in your office who asked to continue working while you went to lunch so he could finish the job as soon as possible?

Maybe you wouldn't be fooled by any of these people.  But then again, if they were warm, friendly individuals who were asking you sincerely for help or perhaps offered to help you out of a difficult situation, you might unwittingly give them the access they need to steal information.

Think twice or three times whenever anyone asks you for access to computers, usernames & passwords or access to locked rooms.  I.T. technicians here on campus will no longer be asking you for a password, and if anyone appears in your office claiming to represent any technical services, don't hesitate to make a phone call if you don't know the person.  After all, better safe than sorry! Make sure that information stays secured in your office - log out of your computer when you leave your office and make sure that paper doesn't lay in plain sight where non-employees can read its contents.

This goes for your home life, as well.  Keep a "shred bag" where you put any documents that contain personal identifying information about you.  Be careful about disclosing any personal information over the phone - no reputable company will ask for it!

Links to more information on the art of Social Engineering and how to deal with it:

http://www.secinf.net/Network_Security/Social-Engineering-The-Weakest-Link.html

http://www.tracesecurity.com/news/2005-04-04_1.php

Meridian Mail Shortcuts

Just as you can defer the delivery of an email message as noted in the article above, you can do the same thing for telephone voicemail messages. 

If you have a question for Computer and Telecommunication Services about:

Computer Problems or Related Issues - Call the Information Technology Help Desk at 436-4567

Telephone Service or Problems - Call the Office of Telecommunications at 436-2577

Directory Assistance - call 436-3500

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