innovative technology services
The Eduserv Software Messenger 19 June 2008
Contents:
1. New Maplesoft Agreement
2. EduCoMS: a brand new online community for IT professionals
3. How to make the most out of your OpenAthens subscription
4. News about EndNote Web and EndNote X2
5. Invitation to Academic Applications Forum Meeting
6. Your software wishes
1. New Maplesoft Agreement
Eduserv Chest is very pleased to announce the signing of a Chest Agreement with Waterloo Maple Inc. for their advanced mathematical and analytical software. The Maplesoft product family allows users to solve mathematical problems and create technical applications.Key highlights of the Agreement include:
• Site licence for Maple with MapleNET and Maple Toolbox for MATLAB
• Three year agreement which sites may purchase a three-year licence for at any point during the term (licences will survive the Agreement term where applicable)
• Pricing is based on JISC banding with significant savings for very small, small, and medium institutions and increased product coverage for all sites including large.
• Unique rights to use Maplesoft products via thin client network (such as Citrix) or remote access software (such as PC Anywhere) when a site has purchased the Student Distribution Extension.
The Agreement covers pricing options for the full-range of Maplesoft products and add-ons, including:
o Maple
o Maple Toolbox for MATLAB
o MapleNET
o Global Optimisation Toolbox
o Finance Toolbox
o Maple-NAG connector
o Database Integration Toolbox
o LabVIEW Toolbox
o Advanced Engineering Maths eBook
o Calculus Study Guide
o Pre-Calculus Study Guide
o The Mathematics Survival Kit (Maple Edition)
o Maple T.A.
o Maple T.A. Building Block for Blackboard Learning System™
For full pricing details and further information on the Maplesoft Agreement please read the Overview or visit the Chest Website.
Following the successful negotiation of the Microsoft Campus Agreement last November, Eduserv has been working with Microsoft and UCISA to launch EduCoMS (http://www.educoms.net/), a new community website for IT professionals using Microsoft technologies in HE and FE institutions.
2. EduCoMS: a brand new online community for IT professionals
Anyone looking for support, shared wisdom and experiences of building IT solutions based on Microsoft products should make EduCoMS their first port of call. Featuring document libraries, forums, wiki pages and news on a wide range of tools such as Sharepoint, Exchange, Windows Server and more, EduCoMS is run by and for the HE and FE IT community.
We’re currently encouraging everyone in the community to start contributing their views and experiences. Every new post will be rewarded with National Book Vouchers and there are five Star Community Member prizes of a ticket to the Microsoft Tech Ed 2008 Conference in Barcelona – worth €2,245 exc VAT!
Please pass on details of EduCoMS to any of your colleagues who may find it useful.
Around 260 institutions have now joined the UK Access Management federation. As of Mon 16th June 243 universities and colleges in the UK have committed to OpenAthens.
3. How to make the most out of your OpenAthens subscription
Institutions subscribing to OpenAthens will be able to continue to access their protected Athens resources and participate in the federation from 1st Aug.
We know many of you have questions such as:
• How will this all work in practice?
• How do you participate in the federation with OpenAthens?
• How can you simplify the user registration process?
• How can you take full advantage of MyAthens?
• What about reporting and statistics?
• How do you get support if you have any problems?
• What about the future?
Eduserv are running two events specifically for OpenAthens Administrators to address these questions and help you to maximise the return on your subscription to OpenAthens.
Tuesday 22nd July - Think Tank, Birmingham http://www.thinktank.ac/
Wednesday 23rd July - Woburn House, London http://www.woburnhouse.co.uk/
Both venues are close to railway / tube stations and the program will run from 10am to 3pm to make it easy for your travel arrangements.
To reserve your place please email openathens@eduserv.org.uk with the names of the people that wish to attend and any special dietary requirements.
Lunch and refreshments will be provided. A full program and joining instructions will be issued in July to all registered delegates.
In the meantime if you have any questions feel free to contact the Eduserv Help Desk on 01225 474380 or email openathens@eduserv.org.uk.
Adept Scientific and Eduserv are pleased to announce an amendment to the agreement between Eduserv and Thomson Scientific to extend it to 2013, with the addition of site-wide licences for EndNote Web.
4. News about EndNote Web and EndNote X2
Under the revised Chest Agreement institutions can now add EndNote Web to their EndNote desktop site licences free of charge or purchase a yearly licence for EndNote Web as a stand-alone package.
EndNote Web is a web-based bibliographic referencing tool that is suitable for undergraduate and further education students who do not require the full power and flexibility of a desktop package. It provides the tools to help students to collect references and to cite and format them correctly in their essays, papers and dissertations.
EndNote Web is designed to work with EndNote desktop; references can be transferred between the two allowing users to continue their work wherever they are.
As a web-based research solution with individual accounts held on the Thomson Reuter server, EndNote Web helping to reduce strain on university or college IT resources. When updates are released, they go live immediately and are automatically available when users log in to their accounts - no IT intervention is required.
Agreement details: http://www.eduserv.org.uk/chest/agreements/software/existing/thomson_researchsoft
Adept Scientific has also announced a major upgrade to EndNote X2 which is described in the press release at http://www.adeptscience.co.uk/pressroom/article/284
5. Invitation to Academic Applications Forum Meeting
The next meeting of the Academic Applications Forum will take place on Wednesday 9 July 2008 at Birmingham University.
The Forum provides the HE and FE communities with experienced based solutions for the provision of applications software. Meetings are informal and take place three times per year. They are attended by computing service staff and members of Eduserv.
Owen LeBlanc of the University of Manchester will give a presentation on Xen Virtualisation at the start of the next meeting. This will be followed by the usual agenda.
For the full agenda and location information please see http://www.eduserv.org.uk/upload/chest/aaf/agenda_2008_07_09.pdf
Please email Paul Hatton if you would like to attend the meeting advising him of any special dietary requirements.
We look forward to seeing you in Birmingham.
If you would like Eduserv Chest to investigate an agreement for software that would benefit your institution, why not make a wish? Wishes are the best way for you to tell us which products we should be negotiating on your behalf.
6. Your software wishes
If you would like to make a wish for a new products then please complete our online Wishform: http://www.eduserv.org.uk/chest/future_agreements/add_a_new_wish
To view the complete software wish list: http://www.eduserv.org.uk/chest/future_agreements/wishes?productType=S
VMWare - Computing Enterprise Management
http://www.vmware.com/
107 wishes – progress towards a Chest agreement is expected following meeting arranged for later this month
Camtasia Studio - screen capture and recording software
http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia.asp
36 wishes – to be revisited in the autumn
Adobe Captivate - interactive simulations and software demonstrations
http://www.adobe.com/products/captivate/
6 wishes – negotiations continue
Proofpoint – Unified Email Security, Data Leak Prevention and Encryption
http://www.proofpoint.com/id/higheredwebinar092007/index.php?id=3
New wish