If you initiate Zoom sessions using the UC account (as distinct from any private Zoom account you may have) note that from next week waiting rooms will be in use for external guests so you will have to allow participants (who are not staff or students) into your session. The ITS message follows:

• Zoom has mandated that either the waiting room feature or password are enabled at account setting beyond 19 July 2020 to increase security.
• Enabling waiting rooms feature will provide the least amount of disruption to end users, and anticipate the lesser amount of potential support calls and tickets..
• The waiting room feature for external users outside of UC. Any UC users (staff and students) will be set by default to by-pass the waiting room and join the meeting..
• More info and FAQ on Waiting Room for Zoom can be found here https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/360045009111

From 10 am Tuesday 30th June, Counterculture (and all the other blogs such as Intercom) will be unavailable for an unspecified time.

The underlying software is being upgraded by ITS.

Over mid-term break ITS are moving some of their systems onto newer, faster hardware.  Tomorrow (Tuesday) 5 of our servers are moving.

While work is starting before the library opens, is is likely that for a short time after we open the Catalogue and Kā Kohika will be unavailable.

Ngā Peter K

For those of you working in Central on Monday evening:

From ITS:

On Monday 22nd June 2020 from 6pm IT Services will be performing scheduled maintenance of the Internet firewall.

The target time frame for this maintenance window is approximately 4 hours.

Internet connectivity may be temporarily unavailable for up to 15 minutes during these scheduled works..

On Monday, June 15, 2020, ProQuest will open the door to the ProQuest Platform (http://search.proquest.com) and enable direct entry from the open web. This functionality allows users to search, find and preview more than 900 million documents without authentication and retrieve Open Access full-text content curated by ProQuest.

It’s the first in a series of enhancements that will streamline research, extend pathways to access and increase usage of the materials libraries have invested in. In the coming months, ProQuest content will be accessible directly from major search engine results.

Want to find libguides from other universities? This tip from James Cook University.

In Summon, go to the Advanced Screen. Then select “Add results beyond your collection” in the “Expand your results” box. In the ‘Content Type’ box, scroll down and tick ‘Research Guide’. Then search the subject of interest.

Why is that relevant? Well, it isn’t really, but it leaves us as the last Horizon library in New Zealand.

I don’t know if we were also the first, but if not we were close to it

Peter

This week, ITS are releasing security patches for UC machines – laptops that you might have at home, and possibly the desktops that you connect to remotely. Their announcement (edited) follows:

Important: If you are working from home using a UC computer (typically one of the laptops) please run the updates from Software Centre as soon as possible, rather than waiting for the deadline to pass. Instructions for installing updates from Software Centre are at the end of this email.

UC Desktop PCs  will have the updates available in the  software centre from 6pm Friday 1st May.  The updates will install automatically on Friday 8th May after 10pm and a restart will be enforced during the update process.

In order to ensure Windows computers patch smoothly, we are recommending staff and postgraduates start installing updates and log out of their computers when they finish work on 8th May. If a computer is off or in sleep mode overnight, updates will be installed the next time the computer is powered on.

Manual Installation
Instructions for UC  computers to manually install the updates from software centre:

Run Software Centre from the start menu. If you cannot see the application, the shortcut is available under the Microsoft System Center folder. If software centre does not start, please contact the service desk for help.

On the left hand side there is a tab called Updates. Click on the tab to show the updates still to be installed. On the top right, there is a link called Update All. Click on this, and the updates will download and install.

In case you get asked about this, we disabled the renewal function in the Catalogue. We are renewing items behind the scenes. Because the library is closed in Horizon, if our borrowers renew their own items there is no ‘sensible’ open date Horizon can choose and so they end up renewed for unusual time periods.

If asked, just remind people that they needn’t worry about renewals for the time we are closed.

Thanks, Peter K

We could all submit photos of our at-home working spaces?