HelpDesk

TCNJ TechTalk 

July 2003 Vol 1 Issue 7  

Back To School Savings On Personal Computer Purchases

As a new school year quickly approaches you may have been wondering if you need to purchase a new home computer.  Here are seven signs that you are long overdue:

7.  Your teenager is embarrassed to be seen "typing on that thing"

6.  You call your manufacturer's tech support and they ask you to repeat what you are running on speaker phone (you have a strong suspicion you hear giggling)

5.  You are using floppy (and we mean floppy!) disks

4.  You use Encyclopedias to research information because it's much quicker than dialing in and connecting to the internet

3.  Your five-year old is complaining that she can't share games with her friends because there isn't a CD Rom drive installed

2.  A swanky Retro shop offered you $25 bucks for that "classic"

1.  Your computer is labeled 'Acorn', 'Atari', or 'Commodore'  

If you are considering a computer purchase, check out the discounts that Apple, Dell, and HP/Compaq are now offering to TCNJ Faculty, Staff and Students.  For your convenience, we've posted links to these manufacturers sites on the IT website: http://www.TCNJ.EDU/~it/

*Note:  The discounts are available for personal computer purchases only.  This equipment is not supported by TCNJ in any way.

 

 

  

 

SOCS 

Simple Online Courseware System

SOCS is a web-based application that makes managing communication between you and your students easy.  If you are not familiar with the SOCS system yet, you are probably not familiar with all the wonderful things you can do.  

For example:

  • Display and print a photo course roster

  • Manage attendance records and set up a self-calculating course grade book

  • Create a discussion board for student interaction

  • Send emails to entire class or selected students

  • Post resources, such as hyperlinks and documents,  for your students to use

  • Set up a Drop Box for students to submit assignments. 

And since SOCS is web-based, it can be accessed from any web browser (i.e. from the comfort of your home).

If you would like more information on SOCS, please visit the SOCS website at http://socs.tcnj.edu and click on the Manual button.


Media Room Training 

Do you need a quick refresher on some of the media equipment that is in your classroom this Fall? Check out MTSS's training schedule and show up for a very informative training session.  There is no appointment necessary, all you need to do is show up!  Hope to see you there!


Microsoft Word AutoCorrect Options

AutoCorrect, one of the Auto functions in the Microsoft Office Suite, is designed to help save you time by automatically correcting commonly misspelled items. 

For example, if you type teh plus a space, then AutoCorrect replaces what you have typed with "the." You can also use AutoCorrect to quickly insert symbols that are included in the built-in list of AutoCorrect entries. For example, type (c) to insert ©.  There is even an option to automatically capitalize the first letter of every sentence. 

When the item is checked, the autocorrect function is active.  If you do not want this option, you can simply remove the check.  Go to Tools>AutoCorrect Options.  Remove the checkmark from the appropriate box(es).

 

Would you like a question answered in next month’s issue? Please forward comments/questions to ohara@tcnj.edu
     http://www.tcnj.edu/~helpdesk