4/12/2007
Lately, I've been thinking a lot about "responsible computing," to put one label on it. Last week my editor, David Nagel, suggested that the phrase might be an oxymoron. He asked me this question: "Is there any such thing as responsible computing?"
4/11/2007
At the University of Florida, about 10,000 of the school's nearly 50,000 students have subscribed to Mobile Campus since it was introduced.
3/29/2007
Park University in Parkville, MO has entered into a partnership with Rave Wireless and Sprint Nextel to launch a mobile phone program for its campuses, which span 21 states. As part of the deal, Rave will provide its academic applications on the phones, while Sprint will extend its wireless network to cover the university's campuses.
3/23/2007
Until today, the promise of converged campuswide communications has been just that--a promise. But now, at institutions such as Dartmouth College, converged communications over secure, high-performance mobility networks has arrived.
3/22/2007
It was only in the last couple of years that the number of laptops shipped annually exceeded the number of desktops. I can still remember....
3/15/2007
Salt Lake City-based CafeScribe, an e-textbook marketplace and social network for students, has announced MyScribe, a new way for students share information, collaborate and communicate.
3/13/2007
A Georgia Tech professor has been running an informal experiment to test whether students who listen before class to lectures via their laptops or personal digital assistants perform better on tests.
2/1/2007
At Macworld in San Francisco earlier this month, Steve Jobs delivered a keynote unveiling Apple’s iPhone. Consumers can line up to get them this coming June. But what does the announcement mean to the higher education market? CT spoke with Wake Forest University Assistant Vice President and CIO Jay Dominick for some insights.
1/9/2007
Here's one for the technician on the move. Chances are that the computers in your school use at least two different types of hard drives—probably more. You have, of course, SATA and PATA 3.5-inch hard drives in your desktops and workstations. But you also have SATA and PATA 2.5-inch drives for your notebooks. (The more recent high-performance notebooks like Apple's MacBook and MacBook Pro use 2.5-inch SATA drives.) And this means that when it comes time for diagnostics, recovery or general maintenance on these drives, you're stuck finding enclosures or docks for each one of these different interface types.
1/2/2007
1/2/2007
US colleges and universities across the country are embracing wireless networking technology with a zeal that is nothing short of phenomenal. The driving force behind wireless connectivity on campus is that it offers myriad benefits for both students and faculty, including greater access and mobility as well as increased collaboration.
12/28/2006
MOST EDUCATORS WORK in brick buildings and the physical world, but Ed Dieterle prefers a virtual alternative. Dieterle is an advanced doctoral candidate and researcher at Harvard University (MA). His current focus is the River City Project, a multi-user virtual environment (MUVE) that’s similar in look and feel to The Sims, a popular online simulation game from Electronic Arts.
12/27/2006
Sometimes, our technology cues come from unexpected places. A recent article in The Economist declared that “mobile phones are changing world politics faster than academics can follow,” and noted that last August in violence-plagued Burundi, Africa, residents used cell phones to report fresh corpses seen in local rivers —allowing UN soldiers to investigate before crocodiles could consume the evidence. Killers could no longer rely on inaction to cover their traces.
12/27/2006
IS YOUR MOST vital information walking out the door or sneaking off campus? That’s the question you must address in the age of mobile computing. A decade ago, most university information was safely protected in data centers or tucked away on departmental servers. But e-mail, FTP software, USB thumb drives, smart phones, notebook computers, and other mobile devices mean your data is always on the move.
12/27/2006
Gary Landau is director of network services at Loyola Marymount University (CA), where he is responsible for leading the school’s network infrastructure and telecom teams to support voice and data communications. No one is more tuned in to wireless these days than Landau, because LMU is now in the process of completing a campuswide wireless network of nearly 400 access points (APs). Landau hopes that the university can leverage wireless connectivity to help students and faculty innovate, and he knows that careful planning of the wireless network can make all the difference. Here, he shares his Top 10 things to remember when taking your campus wireless.
12/11/2006
Can auxiliary services be mission-critical? You bet they can. With tuition on the rise, Auxiliary Services departments at a variety of colleges and universities are proving that they can innovate and still save their parent institutions cash.
7/31/2006
Personal digital assistants, or PDAs, have proven especially popular with medical schools, where the volume of data such devices store for easy retrieval can help students easily access both clinical data and reference materials.
6/27/2006
2/28/2006
2/3/2006
1/13/2006
Each year at the Macworld conference in San Francisco, attendees eagerly await news of the latest Apple technology introductions and upgrades. This week, Apple CEO Steve Jobs did not disappoint, delivering the opening keynote with plenty of exciting announcements and demos that had the audience cheering.
1/11/2006
The loss of a favorite cell phone leads our columnist to experiment with the cool new ones that college kids are using. So far the results are mixed.
12/29/2005
As cell phones proliferate on campus, schools uncover revenue by delivering sports-related mobile content at a premium.
11/29/2005
The dream of ubiquitous computing and communications on campus is now becoming a reality for many colleges and universities. Here’s the best-practice primer for institutions looking to get on board in 2006.
10/24/2005
I have no idea why Mozilla Thunderbird crashed on me this morning. First I could not send any messages, not through my “umich” nor my “scup” identity. Then my inbox disappeared. Then Thunderbird refused to boot up at all yet, when I reinstalled it, Windows told me that I couldn’t install it – because it was already running. Of course, I could not see or use it.