Welcome to new VCU CIO Alex Henson!

VCU Technology Services welcomes our new chief information officer, Alex Henson, on April 1, 2013. Alex begins his life as a Ram after serving as chief operating officer and executive director for administration and operations at the University of Chicago Office of Information Technology Services. Be sure to welcome Alex as you see him moving around campus to learn more about VCU.

The new appsforVCU Getting Started Guide is also available in PDF format on the Gone Google site. This is a great resource for learning about the service and the getting up and running quickly. Just look for it on the right when visiting the site. After downloading, you will need Adobe Acrobat or other third-party software to view the guide. Please keep coming back to the Gone Google site as we will be updating this guide and posting other announcements throughout the migration.

Pictured left to right: Jonathan Cox, Scott Davis, Jim Yucha, Donghai Huangfu

We are  pleased to announce that our Web Services team (pictured right with Scott Davis, IT Division Director for Application Services) has been honored as a Platinum Winner in the Mobile Innovation category of the Catalyst Awards by Blackboard, Inc. The Catalyst Awards are judged by a panel composed of clients and select Blackboard staff members. Blackboard describes the Catalyst Awards as honoring those who push the boundaries of their educational programs and technology in order to deliver innovative and effective learning experiences… The Mobile Innovation category, in particular, … honor those who have embraced the use of mobile technology to positively impact the educational experience at their institution. The Mobile Innovation Awards recognize those who have helped to define the emerging field of mobile technology for use in and beyond the classroom environment.

The Web Services team’s most visible work in the mobile arena has been the stewardship of the VCU Mobile app for iPhone, Android, and Blackberry. This application has evolved over the last two years into a valuable every day tool for the VCU community. The latest version added augmented reality to the Maps module. When an iPhone is pointed in a direction the VCU buildings in that direction pop up on the screen. Just tap one of the building pins to learn more about the building. The team has also worked behind the scenes to ensure that existing VCU data such as event and course information are readily available and easy to access via the mobile platform. Most recently, the team deployed the Dining mobile module that shares daily the menus for all the Dining Services locations on campus. Web Services has also championed standards for VCU websites and services to be available in a format that transfers well to the mobile screen. This is important as smartphones and tablets such as the iPad and Kindle Fire continue to grow as the primary way to access information. The web is going mobile and Web Services is making sure that VCU is driving innovation for greater service to the VCU community.

Congratulations to the Web Services team for this honor recognizing their hard work. Representatives of the team will receive their award in July at BbWorld.

Congratulations to the VCUCard staff for their new found hardware. David Phillips is pictured here accepting the award for VCUCard. David is the the third person from the right. Great job team VCUCard!

In an effort to take down a cyber crime ring, the FBI seized a number of malicious DNS servers used by cyber criminals to serve malicious websites to workstations infected with this “DNS Changer” malware. In order to complete the take down, the FBI has replaced these malicious DNS servers with legitimate temporary servers, and will be shutting off all of the DNS servers on July 9, 2012. If any workstations infected with the “DNS Changer” malware is still not cleaned by July 9, 2012, then it is possible for these workstations to lose Internet connection until they are properly cleaned. The FBI has released the following article to help consumers in identifying and remediating against the “DNS Changer” malware. In order to avoid any possible Internet outage, please verify that your work and home computers are clean and free of this “DNS Changer” malware.

FBI article on DNS Changer: http://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2011/november/malware_110911/DNS-changer-malware.pdf

The fun starts at 9 a.m. on Tuesday, April 3rd on the Monroe Park campus in Student Commons in the Richmond Salons. We follow up with day 2 on Wednesday, April 4th, at 9 a.m. on the MCV campus at TML Library. Lunch will be available but the big draw is the sessions and prizes such as an iPad giveaway each day. Email Services will also be giving away a Google Chromebook and a Google Lava lamp. Groovy! Check out the Tech Fair site for all the details.