Tag Archives: Google Apps

Google Apps now available through the Course Hub

We are pleased to announce that instructors can now create Google Apps folders for their classes via the Course Hub. The following short video shows the process:

The Course Hub will create the class folder and share it with the instructors, students, and audits groups for your course section. The Hub also makes it easy to set the default role for students/audits: either “Reader” which can only view documents and files or “Writer” which allows students/audits to create and upload documents and files.

As recently announced, we hope to provide a similar integration for Office 365/OneDrive in the coming months.

 

Google Apps dropping support for IE8 on 11/15/2012

Internet Explorer 10 launches on 10/26/2012, and as a result, Google will discontinue support for Internet Explorer 8 shortly afterwards, on 11/15/2012. After this date users accessing Google Apps services using Internet Explorer 8 will see a message recommending that they upgrade their browser.

The latest versions of Google Chrome and Firefox are the recommended web browsers for Middlebury’s Google Apps instance.

Read more about this announcement from Google here.

A New Look for Middlebury Google Apps

Earlier this year, Google announced a project to bring a new and improved Google experience. Google began rolling out a new look and feel across products to make the interfaces consistent, streamlined, and easy to use. The new look is a permanent change for all Google Apps users and the schedule will be as follows.

Docs: Tuesday December 13, 2011
Sites: Tuesday December 13, 2011
Calendar: Beginning of January 2012

Feel free to write to gadmin@middlebury.edu with any questions!

–Chris

Middlebury Google Apps Changes

Over the next few weeks, Google will be making some changes to the Google Apps infrastructure that may affect you.

If you have used your Middlebury email address to sign up for “consumer” Google services, you will have to change the email address associated with those services to a non-Middlebury address. “Consumer” Google services are common web-based applications from Google such as: Alerts, Blogger, Books, Docs, iGoogle, Maps, Picasa Web Albums, Reader, Sites, Translate, and many others.

If you have an existing Middlebury Google Apps account, it will be automatically transitioned to the new Google Apps infrastructure. While your access to Middlebury Google Apps services won’t be affected by this change, the first time you log into Middlebury Google Apps after your account has transitioned, you will have to accept a new terms of service agreement.

If you have any questions, please contact gadmin@middlebury.edu for more information.

Chris Norris
LIS Administration

Update on Evaluation of Google Apps for Higher Ed

Our evaluation of Google Apps for Higher Education continues. In preparation for a campus-wide conversation this fall, we are doing in-depth comparison of Google Apps with Microsoft Exchange 2010.  This work will culminate in a set of public presentations in late August and early September, which in turn will be the materials we use for the campus-wide conversation.

The comparison between Google Apps and Microsoft Exchange is organized into the following ten topics. In the chart below, you will find the topic, a link to the draft outline of the presentation, and the date, time, and place for each presentation.

Topic (with link to outline) Date, Time, and Location
calendar August 31, 2:00-3:00 LIB105
email August 31, 1:00-2:00 LIB105
groups/mailing lists September 1, 2:00-3:00 LIB145
tasks/ to do lists September 2, 11:00-12:00 LIB145
costs September 1, 3:00-4:00 LIB145
privacy September 3, 10:00-11:00 LIB145
security September 2, 10:00-11:00 LIB145
administration September 3, 9:00-10:00 LIB145
other features: sites, docs, chat, etc. September 3 – 11:00-12:00
support Aug 31 – 3:00 – 4:00

The outlines are available on the Google Apps Evaluation blog, where we are also posting additional readings and thoughts.  We encourage you to make comments and suggestions on them in order that the comparison be as complete as possible. In addition, we will post a written version of the presentation a week in advance of the presentation in order to allow for questions and comments from those who can not attend the presentation, and in order to allow the time at the presentation to focus on discussion.

Google Apps for Education Evaluation Underway

Middlebury is evaluating Google Apps for Education as a possible replacement for Microsoft Exchange as its platform for email and calendaring. We’ve set up a website about this evaluation process that includes a summary of the process and the key questions we are asking. We will host an open session on this evaluation in early May in order to ensure that there are opportunities for the entire community to learn more about Google Apps for Education, to understand the evaluation process, and to provide input and feedback. The website is Google Apps @ Middlebury Project.  You can ask questions and make comments via this site, or feel free to contact Michael Roy (mdroy@middlebury.edu) .

Educause Live webcast on Google Apps

Join us in LIB 145 on Thursday, April 22, at 1:00 pm, as we listen in on Macalester College’s experience with Google Apps, an Educause Live webcast.

“The Google Apps hosted e-mail solution continues to draw a great deal of interest from higher-education institutions. A recent informally planned conference call with a few interested institutions snowballed into a web conference with over a hundred institutions attending. Ted Fines and David Sisk will focus on Macalester’s experience with Google over the past two years of integrating, maintaining, and supporting Google Apps for their user community, with some analysis of why there is such high interest in Google’s hosted solution.”