Southern Polytechnic: Information Technology

Student accounts are generated after the Registrar’s Office adds a student to the student information system at the start of the first semester of enrollment.

New students can activate their network ID via the web at: http://accounts.spsu.edu/ (you must know your Student ID number and PIN to activate your account)

SPSU uses BANNER for student records and classroom scheduling. Faculty members and Academic Affairs staff use BANNER to generate lists of students enrolled in a course, enter grades, make room reservations, and to generate the course bulletin for each semester. Students use BANNER to check their grades, register for classes, pay tuition, and view their academic transcript.

Campus Wide Software Licenses

Information Technology manages software license management servers and classroom/lab computers for the SPSU campus. Many applications are available for installation across campus. A listing of software available as campus-wide licenses can be found at: http://www.spsu.edu/infotech/software.html We are always looking to enhance the access of software on campus, so if you have any suggestions for additional software that would benefit from a site-license, please contact David Stone (dstone@spsu.edu).

The IT Division operates two computer labs, one located on the second floor building H (The Workshop, room 242), with 60 computers, and a multimedia authoring lab located in C135 (Library Annex). The Workshop (H-242) also serves as a walk-up help desk. This lab also is the location to get your computer configured to use the campus wireless network and is the location of our equipment checkout program. Color printing is available in this lab.

Email/Network ID

Your SPSU email/network ID gives you access to the SPSU email system, laboratory computers, , personal web space (“W:” Drive), network storage (“Z:” drive), and many other services. SPSU uses email extensively for campus announcements and other official communication. Access to SPSU email is available from off campus via an internet connection and web browser via the address: http://zimbra.spsu.edu

Equipment Checkout

Information Technology provides equipment checkout services for faculty, staff, and students via the Workshop (H-242). Mini-DV camcorders, digital cameras, tripods, a PA system, wireless microphones, laptops, projectors, and other equipment is available at this location. Please call the IT lab or the IT Helpdesk in order to reserve equipment or determine availability (678-915-4357) of equipment. A list of equipment available can be found at: http://www.spsu.edu/infotech/equipment.html

Helpdesk (Walkup in H-242)

Students can get their laptops configured for use with the campus wireless network, as well as get basic computer support in the DoIT computer lab located in H-242.

Hornet Connect http://connect.spsu.edu is a web based tool that provides SPSU students, faculty, and staff with the ability to connect to campus Information Technology infrastructure. Students and faculty can post web pages and images from off campus locations and access their network storage drives (the “Z”, student, drive, and the “titan” faculty network drive). Library collections that are not typically accessible from off-campus locations are available through the Hornet Connect tool.

Students can save work completed in campus labs via the “Z:” drive. This drive is usually mapped to the local computer on most campus labs, but can also be accessible via the local area network by typing “\\io\” into either windows explorer or internet explorer. This folder also stores student “profiles” which include your own customizable desktop background, desktop files, and other software application data. This space is limited to 60 MB. Currently, there is no way to access this drive from off campus.

SPSU Community Board

The SPSU Community Board http://forums.spsu.edu is a tool designed to facilitate sharing, interaction, and learning in an online collaboartion space. This tool is being used as part of the first year experience program, but also can be used for the support of instruction and campus community building.. To access the Hornet Board, you must log in with your SPSU Network ID and password.

Note: For access to the Hornet Community Board from off-campus or via Hornet Wireless you must use the Hornet Connect VPN system.

Software Purchasing

Students, faculty and staff can purchase discounted software through the University System of Georgia's online software portal, eMSD.

Telephone Services

SPSU uses a VOIP system for all telephone calls. The ShoreTel Call Manager is useful software application that provides easy access to many of the advanced features that our phone system provides. If you would like the ShoreTel software installed on you office machine, please call the IT helpdesk at: 678-915-4357 (HELP). The instructions for the ShoreTel system are available at: http://www.spsu.edu/infotech/help/phone/ShorelineBrochure.pdf

Training and Workshops

The Division of Information Technology periodically offers workshops for students. Check with the DoIT computer lab staff in H-242 to find out the latest workshop offerings.

Vista is a tool that facilitates the creation of Web-based educational environments. It is a medium for online learning. It provides tools for course management, communication, and collaboration. Vista can be used to create online courses, or to publish materials that supplement existing courses. There is minimal technical expertise required from the instructor (a knowledge of HTML or a graphical web-page editor is helpful). Vista is entirely web-based. Campus computers should already be configured with the proper version of JAVA for Vista http://www.spsu.edu/webct/

When you create a Workshop account/E-mail account a student web site is created for you. The contents are accessable inside Workshop enabled labs, everything inside the "W" drive is on your web site. This can also be accessed anywhere on campus by mapping a drive to "\\io.spsu.pri\yourUserID". For information about how to map a drive see our FAQ, drive mapping section. The web site is viewable by going to

http://students.spsu.edu/yourUserID

You can also find your page at: http://students.spsu.edu

or look up other students' web sites. There is a 2M quota on the amount of data you can store on this drive. At this time there is no way to remotely add/modify your site, this is mainly due to security concerns. The web servers do not support any server side languages, such as java, C/C++, perl, etc. But client side languages like JavaScript are not prohibited.

Wireless internet access is available throughout most of campus. The IT wireless network requires the use of an 802.1x protocol with EAP-TTLS Authentication (native to some computer systems and network cards). A software client to support wireless is available for SPSU faculty, staff, and students in the IT Workshop in H-242.