Latest News

UCCSC is sold out, but you’re still invited to hear the keynote speakers

This month’s University of California Computing Services Conference at UC Davis sold out weeks ago, but everyone is still welcome to come hear the keynote speeches presented by two highly accomplished California technologists.

Their talks in the Mondavi Center are free and public. The speakers are:

UC Davis will improve campus cybersecurity by pursuing broader use of Duo

Starting this summer, you’ll see greater use of Duo multi-factor authentication at UC Davis. And as use grows, the damage caused by phishing will shrink.

Duo is a security app. It works by asking you for two “factors” when you sign in to an account protected by Duo: your usual password, plus a temporary code created by Duo, typically sent via the Duo app to your smartphone. (There are alternatives if you can’t use a smartphone—more below.)

SmartSite enters storage, as planned

If you’re looking for SmartSite, it’s no longer there.

As planned, the former UC Davis learning management system went offline when June ended and has entered digital storage. Traffic to smartsite.ucdavis.edu has been redirected to a Knowledge Base article that explains the change.

If you’re a faculty or staff member who still needs materials from your old sites, you have options.

UC Davis teaching and tech conference meets Sept. 14, invites faculty ‘microtalks’

Plans are taking shape for the 2018 Summer Institute on Teaching and Technology (SITT), where UC Davis faculty will “meet with colleagues from across the disciplines, talk about teaching discoveries and strategies, and learn about new technologies that help our students accomplish their learning objectives.”

Information and Educational Technology presents the program each summer at no charge to participants (this photo shows one of the 2017 presentations). This year's sessions will meet Sept. 14 in 1309 The Grove (Surge III).

Campus adds Duo to post-phishing recovery tactics

Ideally, no one’s UC Davis account would ever be harmed by a phishing scam.

But because phishing is pervasive, UC Davis is now offering Duo as a resource to help faculty and staff protect their campus Office 365 accounts as part of the recovery if their accounts do get compromised.

Remnant of SmartSite enters storage on June 30

This is it. What’s left of SmartSite will go offline next month.

But first, thanks to a tool created at UC Santa Cruz, materials in Resources folders inside old SmartSite sites will be copied into Box folders that the sites’ owners can have if they want. The owners can then keep or discard the materials as they wish.

Information and Educational Technology (IET) is making the copies to provide additional support, particularly for faculty, as the campus closes out its use of SmartSite.

After eduroam gets new certificate, you might get a prompt

Heads up if you use eduroam, the UC Davis wireless network.

The campus will install a new electronic security certificate on eduroam at 7 a.m. Tuesday, May 15, which means you might see a prompt on your phone or other device sometime after then asking you to accept the new certificate.

The certificate tells your device it’s connecting to eduroam. Some devices will accept the certificate automatically. Your experience will vary depending on your device, model, and operating system.

Notice of lost files from old SmartSite course or project sites

An accidental deletion of files contained in old SmartSite course and project sites has led to the loss of about 161,000 uploaded files, or about 2 percent of all files uploaded to the former learning management system.

The lost files varied in size and type, ranging from homework assignments and syllabi to files attached to emails. All were uploaded to SmartSite from June through December 2016, except for about 100 files from early 2017. Of the total, about 9.3 percent were uploaded by instructors. Almost all of the rest were uploaded by students.

Entries due in May for UC’s IT innovation prize

If you’ve done innovative work with technology at UC Davis during the past few years, here’s your chance to share the achievement throughout the University of California—and get recognized at a UC-wide IT conference that meets at UC Davis this year.

Considering applying for one of the 2018 Larry L. Sautter awards.

Cooperating on computers

Aggie Desktop, an emerging service, improves the way the campus manages desktop computing environments for staff and faculty by offering a common set of hardware, software and processes. The leadership and support of the service are similarly collaborative, drawing from the talents of four large academic and administrative organizations: The College of Engineering; Finance, Operations and Administration; the College of Letters and Science; and Information and Educational Technology.