Welcome Back!

Academic Affairs has committed substantial funds toward putting an up-to-date computer on the desk of every tenured and tenure-track faculty member on campus and to replacing them on a regular basis in the future, as they become obsolete.

This program, the Faculty Computer Trade-in program or FaCT, was announced on June 26, 2000, by UIC Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs Elizabeth Hoffman.

The ACCC will administer the FaCT program, providing every tenure-track faculty member with a new personal computer -- your choice of a well-equipped Windows personal computer or a slightly less well-equipped Mac (Macs are a bit more expensive) -- on a rotating 3- or 4-year cycle. The FaCT computers will come with a network connection, hardware service, and access to the ACCC Server Services shared-software program.

Fact will be phased in over a 3-year period, with the third of UIC's faculty most in need of an update receiving new computers the first year. The FaCT Web site has all the details, including a description of the FaCT machines and links to a list of eligible faculty and to an automated facility that helps us determine who the "neediest" faculty are: http://www.uic.edu/depts/accc/hardware/fact/

AHEAD , ACCC Help and Answer Database, is the ACCC's new Web- and email-based problem database. It's on the Web at:
    http://consult.accc.uic.edu
or click the AHEAD (HelpDesk) link in the "Quick Start" section on the left on the ACCC home page:
    http://www.accc.uic.edu
We're using AHEAD for all ACCC help email addresses now, including consult@uic.edu.

Get ahead with AHEAD ! (Sorry about that!)

The neatest thing about AHEAD is that it allows you to log and reply to problems on the Web, as well as by email, so you may choose whichever method you prefer. Or both, when that's convenient. AHEAD's Web interface allows you to see all of the communication about all of your recent problems, at any time, from anywhere, even if you don't have a working email system. (That's good if your problem is that your Eudora is broken!)

To make sure that only you can access your problems, when you use AHEAD on the Web, you'll have to login using your ACCC netid and password. (Just like Nessie and most other ACCC, UIC, and U of I personalized Web services.)

Even if you post your problem on the Web, you'll receive email from AHEAD when we reply to it. Email from AHEAD looks a bit different from the Problem Database email you may have gotten from us in the past. The subject is [ProblemDB], then a 4-digit number and a brief description of the problem. The number is your AHEAD problem ticket number.  And there's a URL at the bottom of each AHEAD message, which will take you directly to all the correspondence about that problem on the Web.

If you decide to reply by email, be sure to reply to the note you receive from AHEAD. Sending a new note opens a new problem, which won't help. And please don't include more of the note you're replying to than you have to. Some problem tickets already have gotten a bit too long to handle.

So, to log a new problem or to view all of your recent problems, go to:

http://consult.accc.uic.edu

Or just send email to consult@uic.edu as always.

There's a new Network Services Kit out, and it's one you should look into, even if you've already got the NSKit or its components installed. This NSKit has a new install feature; it can check on the Web to see whether there's new software to include or updated versions of the software that's already there. (It's similar to Netscape's SmartUpdate.)

Try it out; it might be the last NSKit you have to install from the CD!

To go with the new NSKit, there's a new group of dialin lines, at 1(312)666-2001. Like the other ACCC dialin lines, login is required and there's a five-hour time limit. But these lines are different, too -- they are set up specifically to be used with the Windows version of the new NSKit, so they use the standard Windows dialin procedure to initiate connections.

(Not installing the new NSKit? See ACCC Dialin Services for links to instructions on how to reconfigure your Windows personal computer for these lines; click the link on the ACCC home page: http://www.accc.uic.edu)

Are you tired of going to the printer in an ACCC lab, sifting through the output, and not finding yours? Are you frustrated because it's not printed yet and you don't know when it will be? Are you upset when you print a job and then find out that the printer in the lab is out of service? Are you concerned about the privacy of your output?

If you are, you're not alone! We have listened to you and are implementing a new way of printing in the ACCC public labs that addresses many of these problems. The U-Print system will make it easier and more reliable to print, will reduce the amount of wasted output, and will reduce the wear-and-tear on the lab printers.

The key difference in U-Print is that jobs you send to a printer in an ACCC lab will not print until you go to the printer, log in, and select the job to be printed. This is happens regardless of where you submit the job from -- from a Windows PC or Mac in that lab, from a PC or Mac in another ACCC lab, or from your icarus or tigger UNIX workstation account.

• The U-Print system will make it easier for you to find your print job output because the job will not be printed until you request it.
  
  
• You will be at the printer ready to pick up your output as soon as it prints, so your privacy isn't compromised.
  
  
• Once your job is submitted for printing, you can print it in any ACCC lab. (This is true in the majority of cases, but there are exceptions. Jobs formatted for output on a specialized printer, such as the plotter in the Art and Architecture lab, must be printed on a compatible printer. Which, in the case of the A&A plotter, is just that plotter.)

Among the main goals of U­Print is to reduce waste, and there's lots of that in the labs. Allowing you to cancel jobs you don't want printed is one way that U­-Print addresses this problem, but there's another. We will institute a printing quota, which will not be enforced until the spring semester.

When implemented, the quota will be 150 pages per semester, per person. "Pages" means physical pages printed on black and white printers; duplex pages -- ones printed on both sides of the paper -- will be charged as one page. Pages printed in color or on other specialized printers may have different rate schedules; the rates will be posted by each printer. (We're experimenting with color printers now and hope to have them available in several labs soon.)

If you go over your quota, you'll be charged 8 cents per physical page printed on black and white printers. Again, other printers may have a different rate schedule.

Oh, and we need to define semester, don't we? The semester is defined as the period between the week before classes start until the week before the next semester starts. Quotas will not carry over from semester to semester.

1. You submit something to be printed, either from an ACCC public PC or when you're logged in to your tigger or icarus account.
   
   
2. When you're ready to print your print job, at any time up to 12 hours after you submitted it, go to a U-Print station next to a printer in an ACCC lab and bring your UIC i-card with you.
   
   
3. Insert your UIC i-card in the card reader next to the U-Print station. The card reader works like an ATM card reader; it holds onto your i-card while you're using the U-Print station.
   
   The card reader front panel will display the amount of money that you currently have on the i-card. For fall semester and while you're below your quota in spring semester and beyond, a total value of $0.00 is just fine.
   
   
4. Login using your ACCC netid and password, select the job you want to print, and click Print. (Or Delete to cancel the job.)
   
   
5. Logout. The card reader will eject your i-card; be sure to take it with you when you go.

For more information, including how you'll add value to your i-card once we begin enforcing the print quota, visit the U-Print Web page:

http://www.accc.uic.edu/pclabs/u-print/