Tech News - February 2023

Welcome to the February issue of Tech News.

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He Whatu Pūmanawa & UniAccess - when to use which

He Whatu Pūmanawa now automatically creates Waikato accounts for most staff types as part of the hiring process. Casual, sessional, fixed-term, and permanent staff, along with independent contractors, and honorary employees will be able to logon four (4) weeks prior to their planned start date, as part of the hiring process.

Accounts created in He Whatu Pūmanawa will automatically flow through to UniAccess, which continues to be the tool to manage IT resources and system accesses - this has not changed.

There is no need to create accounts directly in UniAccess for the above staff types, and the functionality has been removed.

For further information see the UniAccess Self Help page.

24/7 Computer Lab in Te Manawa the Student Centre Refreshed for 2023!

The Level 4 computers in Te Manawa the Student Centre Computer Lab have been replaced with 27-inch monitor docks with USB-C connectivity. Students can now bring their own personal laptops - dock and charge them in this space and utilise the larger screen for their course work.

On Level 2 there is now a Pod of Mac computers and a Pod of Linux computers for students to access and use any time of the day and week. Level 2 and Level 3 offers a total of 85 Windows computers, which have the majority of software required for undergraduate study installed.

Please encourage students who need 24/7 access to computers to use Te Manawa the Student Centre computer lab. Student ID Cards automatically have this access already.

Purchasing ICT Equipment - changes from 1 March

Purchasing ICT Consumable Equipment for the UoW
ICT Consumable purchasing is moving out of UniMarket to PCards. This change aligns with the decommissioning of UniOrder as part of the He Whatu Pūmanawa Oracle Cloud transformation.

The UoW discounted pricing will remain for UoW PCard purchases, and the entire PB Tech Website will be open for UoW purchasing.

It is important to remember:

• Any computer, any item over $2k, and any CPU or Motherboard, are considered IT or CAPEX assets and cannot be purchased via PCard. These must still be purchased using the Hardware and Software Purchasing request in Kuhukuhu, and will be processed by ITS on your behalf.
• If you are unsure about what you need to purchase, contact the ICT Support Team, or PB Tech at the UoW Hamilton Support Center for advice, before making your purchase.
• To login to your UoW PB Tech account, use your username@waikato.ac.nz email address, which is associated with your ASB PCard.

Watch the PB Tech Staff PCard Purchasing Video for more information.

Personal Purchasing with UoW Staff Discount at PB Tech
You should stop using your UoW email address for your personal PB Tech account.

The UoW discounted pricing will remain for UoW Staff, including free shipping.

• To continue to access this and avoid your personal purchases from being associated with the University, please sign up, or edit your account to use your personal (non-university) email address (eg; bob.smith@gmail.com).
• To ensure you can access the UoW staff discount with PB Tech, make sure your personal account, using your personal email address, has the UoWStaff membership key entered and saved to your profile.

• If you don’t have a personal non-university email address, create one for free at gmail.com or other similar free email providers.
• If you don’t change your PB Tech account to a personal email address, ITS and Finance may be able to see your purchases, and invoices will have the University of Waikato details on it.

Personal Purchasing with UoW Student Discount at PB Tech
Students can continue to use their students.waikato.ac.nz email address and the UoWStudent Membership key to access their discounts. Nothing changes for them.

Teaching Rooms and Audio Visual Spotlight

With lecture theatre updates continuing, understanding the new software and technology in your teaching room is important. ITS is repeating the teaching room technology training session a further two times:

Hamilton:

• 1.10-2pm Wednesday 1 March, S.1.04
• 3.10-4pm Wednesday 1 March, S.1.03

To register to attend please email its.training@waikato.ac.nz.

If there are any issues during your teaching, make sure you call 6066 using the teaching room phone. These calls are answered immediately. Feedback about teaching rooms can be sent to teaching_rooms@waikato.ac.nz.

ICT Services - what’s new and what’s changed

Hamilton Panopto recording facilities available
I.4.06 and MSB.4.09 have been designed specifically to allow more control over audio, lighting and video backgrounds, letting staff create polished and professional video outputs in Panopto.

The technology allows more control over audio, lighting and backgrounds when recording things like lectures.e.g. appropriate lighting; microphone; good backgrounds and better audio characteristics of the room. The technology is simple to use, and instructions are provided in the room.

Staff wishing to use a room to record lectures for online use, research related content, or other video recording requirements, can book I.4.06 or MSB.4.09 in Resource Booker via “Video Recording Rooms”.

Mobile Phone Plan Changes
The University 2degrees mobile phone plan is changing. The features of the new plan are:

• Endless Data (throttled to 1mb speed after 100GB of usage is reached per mobile number)
• Unlimited calling and texting to any NZ and Australia standard landline or mobile
• Use Hot Spot and tether a device like your laptop to enable internet connectivity where there is no Wi-Fi
• Daily Business Roaming to Australia at no extra cost
• International Data roaming charges still apply. For costs visit the 2degrees website, and type in your destination country to see the charges for using your UoW 2degrees Mobile overseas. Note that 2degrees doesn't have roaming in all countries, and in some countries it may be cheaper to get a local sim card and use that for the duration of your trip.

New Google Marketplace Apps
Slido
Add polls and quizzes to your slides and interact with your participants in real time with Slido.

Save as Doc
Convert a selection from a Sheet to a more readable version in Google Documents using Save As Doc.

See the Google Apps Self Help Page for more information on available apps.

Kuhukuhu Improvements

Kuhukuhu has a new look and extra functionality

• A revamped self service homepage for Kuhukuhu was launched this morning
• New layout and functionality lets you navigate and search for services more quickly
• Notices have been combined so there is one place to check for ICT information including service impacting outages and upcoming maintenance
• Find Answers has been enabled, letting users access How To Guides for our core services. The Kuhukuhu Knowledge Base will grow over time and replace the ICT Self Help website.

Watch the video for an overview of the new features and how Kuhukuhu can work better for you.

Browser and screen resolution tip
Kuhukuhu can appear differently depending on screen resolutions and browser zoom settings. Fortunately you have complete control over these settings for your device and can adjust them yourself if needed. Sometimes just decreasing the browser zoom size for Kuhukuhu makes using the application much easier!

Subscription functionality
If you log a request on behalf of someone else, and would like to stay up to date with the request’s progress, make sure you tick the ‘subscribe to this request’ box and add your email address in the field. Any customer updates will be copied to you, and the request will show in your ‘My Items’ as well.

Approvals now part of workflow
Service requests that require approval from a person before they can progress now have an automated workflow that sends an email to the nominated approver which allows them to go into ‘My Items’ and approve (or not) the request.

The service requests below have this workflow approval enabled. Those with an asterix also have a field for a cost centre to be entered - at the moment this is a free text field, and relies on the requestor to select the right approver associated with that code. In the near future, and once the GL code feed is enabled this will be a pick list of available codes, which will then link to the associated DFApprovers for that code:

• Alcohol on University Premises
• Fleet Authorised Driver Application (when logged on behalf of a student. Staff don't need approval)
• *Hardware and Software Purchasing (Software only option)
• *Koha / Refund / Reimbursement / Payments
• *New Staff Starter
• *Non-Standard Hardware or Software Request (ITS Only)
• PCard Services
• *Phones and Voicemail Services
• *Voucher Purchase Request

Planned Maintenance