Tip of the Week: Adding to My Links

Application: SharePoint
SharePoint has its own bookmarking option to allow for direct navigation to frequently used sites. Both SharePoint and other internet sites can be bookmarked. This list of links or bookmarks can be accessed anywhere through SharePoint.

How to add a link or bookmark in SharePoint
1. Go to Share.twu.edu. (From on campus)
2. Navigate to a specific page. For example, click on Instructional Support Services, then select Denton, then select Training.
3. In the upper right corner of the page, click on My Links.
4. Select Add to My Links.
5. A dialog box appears. Make any optional changes needed such as the name of the link, who can view the links, which group to add the link to or create a new group of links.
6. Click OK.

Tip of the Week: Managing Multiple Schedules

Applications: Outlook & SharePoint
Scheduling a meeting with multiple people or managing multiple schedules for various projects can be challenging. Offices use calendars to schedule meetings, vacations, phone coverage, appointments and more. To manage multiple schedules, there are several technology tools available.

Scheduling MeetingsMicrosoft Outlook calendars offer schedule availability options. Each faculty and staff member can designate times as busy, free, tentative, or out of the office. To schedule a meeting in Outlook:

1. Click on the calendar tab in the navigation pane
2. Select the date for the meeting
3. Right-click to open the dialog box and choose an option such as New Appointment, New All Day Event, New Meeting Request, etc.
4. A new dialog box will open. Select options for title, location, length of meeting, reminders, importance, etc.

When inviting others to a meeting with a meeting request, they are given the option to accept, decline, or mark tentative. The meeting request then keeps track of who has responded and how.

Office Calendars
When working with a group of people, SharePoint calendars can be used. The flexibility of SharePoint allows multiple calendars to be built in any site. A different calendar can be used for each project or person. SharePoint calendars can be connected to Outlook for ease of adding and modifying events. SharePoint also has options to determine levels of access to view, edit, or delete events.

Tip of the Week: Dropbox

Web 2.0 Tools Dropbox

Many people work from multiple locations or computers. Some need to access the same file from any location. Files uploaded to Dropbox can be accessed from different computers (Windows, Mac, and Linux), smartphones, or the Dropbox website.

What are the advantages?
• As files are saved in a Dropbox folder, the file is updated from every access point (multiple computers, smartphone)
• Entire folders or individual files can be shared with others
• Files are backed up on the Dropbox server
• Basic account is free with up to 2GB
• File history is kept for 30 days so earlier versions can be restored
• Unlimited undo option
• Files of any type can be stored
• Encryption for both storage and transfer of files
• When using Dropbox to collaborate with others, everyone can see changes when file is saved

Tip of the Week: Using My Site in SharePoint

Application: SharePoint

Each TWU faculty and staff has a My Site space in SharePoint. This is an internal website that can be used to store documents, keep a calendar, project tasks and more. SharePoint is available from on or off campus, making it a flexible way to store and manage information. There are two parts of My Site: My Home and My Profile.

Using My Home in SharePoint
• Personal place to store documents, calendars, surveys, tasks, and lists
• Permissions can be set by item to determine who can view or edit
• Many items can be linked to your Outlook account to view and edit through Outlook

Using My Profile in SharePoint
• Professional public profile page
• Fields to offer information about professional affiliations, skills, contact info, reporting hierarchy
• Option to display a picture

Tip of the Week: Public Folders

Applications: Microsoft Outlook

Public folders are special Outlook accounts that allow a group of people to share email. Public folders can have subfolders as well, for various departmental or project needs.

How are TWU offices using Public Folders?
Departmental email point of contact
Many TWU departments have email enabled public folders so that their department has a generic department point of contact, such as departmentname@twu.edu. These account names can be used in department literature so that several departmental people can process incoming requests.
Departmental central voicemail & fax
Many TWU departments use a public folder for their main line voicemail messages as well as faxes. This can be a time and cost savings to the department.

Tip of the Week: Charts & Tables

Web 2.0 Tools Chartle and Tabelizer

Charts and tables are ways to show data. Many tools are available to create charts and tables for uses in reports, websites, or shared through email and online sources. Several Web 2.0 tools are available to create charts or tables and give HTML code for using the charts on websites.
What are the differences?
• Chartle allows many types of charts to be created, color coded, and shared. Charts can be featured in the Chartle gallery, emailed, or shared on social networking sites such as Facebook or Twitter, among others. With each chart, the HTML code is offered to embed the chart in a website.

• Tabelizer creates a HTML table from spreadsheet data. After the information is entered into the program, options are available to adjust the font size and style as well as the header color. The final product appears on the screen along with the HTML code for use in websites.

Tip of the Week: Speech

Web 2.0 Tools Fotobabble and iSpeech

Using speech as a special sound effect can enhance presentations, blogs, and photographs. Several Web 2.0 tools are available to add speech to photographs and to covert text to speech.

What are the differences?
• Fotobabble allows speech to be added to any photograph. Upload a photograph to the website and use a standard microphone to add audio to the photograph. This can be shared on social networking sites such as Facebook or Twitter, among others, or emailed. Also, a URL is automatically generated for each photograph and can be used on a website or blog.
• iSpeech gives the option to cut and paste text or upload pdf, ppt, htm, xls, doc, blog, rss, txt, or rtf files and have the information converted to speech. Other options include to download it, podcast it or even embed it as an object on any webpage that supports html including: MySpace, Blogger, EBay, etc.

Tip of the Week: Document Location Command

Application: Microsoft Office 2007 Word, Excel, PowerPoint; Microsoft Office 2010 Word, Excel, PowerPoint

When working with Office files, it is important to know the location of the saved document. Files can be saved on a local computer, a storage device, a shared drive, or SharePoint. Microsoft Office has a Document Location command that can be added to the Quick Access Toolbar so that the save location is always visible.

How to add the Document Location command in Office 2007
1. In Word, Excel, or PowerPoint, go to the Office button.
2. Click on Word Options, Excel Options or PowerPoint Options.
3. Select Customize.
4. In the drop down box Choose Commands from, select All Commands.
5. Scroll down to find Document Location, then click Add.
6. Click OK.

How to add the Document Location command in Office 2010
1. In Word, Excel, or PowerPoint go to the File tab.
2. Go to Options.
3. Select Quick Access Toolbar.
4. In the drop down box Choose Commands from, select All Commands.
5. Scroll down to find Document Location, then click Add.
6. Click OK.