itsblog's blog

Hosts Courtney Bentley and Ken Newquist talk about how Lafayette's WordPress pilot is going, discuss their upcoming collaboration project that coordinates Moodle usability testing at six colleges, check out Shibboleth at Brown University and install the ink-saving EcoFont. In Help News, they talk about a new plugin for Firefox that makes copying and manipulating HTML tables a snap and announce upcoming hands-on workshops for Office 2007.

Hosts Ken Newquist and Courtney Bentley talk about a bunch of new projects underway for the spring semester, including Moodle usability testing, a WordPress MU pilot, the official launch of Spaces for intercollegiate collaboration.

In Tech News they look at Mars through Google Earth, check out the 2.7 version of WordPress, and discuss the FCC's decision to push back the Digital TV transition to June. Finally, in help news they review the slate of upcoming workshops to help you get acclimated to the new Zimbra email server.

Welcome to the new and improved Soapbox 3.0! The site's got a new theme, been upgraded to the latest and greatest version of Drupal 5.x, and has returned home to its old "soapbox.lafayette.edu" web address (so be sure to update your bookmarks!)

Everything should have come across without a hitch, but please let us know if you encounter any problems by emailing itsblog@lafayette.edu or adding a comment to this post.

On this edition of the ITS Coffee Break hosts Ken Newquist and Courtney Bentley talk about Lafayette's Election Night Broadcast project and ask for ideas about how to improve Moodle, the college's open source learning management system. In Tech News, they look at how video games are being used to encourage reading, check out a new ebook reader for Apple's iPhone and iPod touch, and discuss new research that claims surfing the web is good for your brain. Finally, in Help News they talk about Adobe's Kuler web app for picking color palettes and give a rundown upcoming brown bag lectures.

Hosts Courtney Bentley and Ken Newquist kick off the early October edition of the ITS Coffee Break with a discussion of fall projects, including a slew of student video projects and "Spaces", a new intercollegiate workspace for faculty that's powered by Moodle and Shibboleth. In Tech News they look at new political and utility apps for the iPhone, check up on a chess match being played between Earth and the International Space Station, and consider Nintendo's answer to Apple's iPod touch: the DSi.

Hosts Ken Newquist and Courtney Bentley kick off this episode of the ITS Coffee Break with a rundown of their summer projects, including the redesign Library web site, a pilot for a new collaborative web site, and the newly-updated iTunes U. In Tech News they take a look at Google's just-released Chrome web browser and dig for tweets using Twitter's new search tool.

On this edition of the ITS Coffee Break hosts Ken Newquist and Courtney Bentley review what's new in Moodle, talk about the Moodle Hack/Doc Fest held at Kenyon College, announce the creation of Lafayette's Second Life Island and take a look at the college's new "Corn on the Quad" blog. In Tech News, they stop by NASA's new "NASA Images" photo archive, try out the "Molecules" application for the iPhone and iPod touch, and review Google's decision to kill it's LibrarianCentral blog.

The last podcast of the 2007-2008 academic year sees hosts Ken Newquist and Courtney Bentley discussing summer plans for upgrading Moodle as well as the role out for the new Network Access Control (NAC) service at Lafayette. In Tech News they discuss the Wordle tool for generating beautiful tag clouds, the release of Firefox 3.0, Lewis & Clark College's use of del.icio.us for organizing environmental studies research resources, the new WorldCat app for Facebook, and this year's Podcamp Philly. Finally, Courtney announces upcoming workshops for July 2008.

Summer is upon us, and to celebrate, hosts Ken Newquist and Courtney Bentley run down their summer reading lists. In additon, they have news about a new faculty blogger on Soapbox and the upcoming NITLE Moodle Users Group Meeting, discuss an interesting example of classroom journalism using blogging and Google Maps, and cheer the return of venerable web development web site WebMonkey.