What an exhausting and long year since last August – my last full vacation!
And exhausting … for ALL OF US! I am so fortunate to have been able to work with such amazing and incredible colleagues at The Computer Help Desk over the past … 500+ DAYS! Yes, it has been that long since we started working remotely, late in March of 2020!
Without ALL of their support, humour, leadership, imagination, guidance and every single possible ‘intangible‘ that each and every single one of them, ALL BRING to our Teams meetings, emails, texts, GIFs, Emojis, Jeopardy, Quote Contests, it would have been impossible to accomplish a fraction of what WE ALL DID AS A TEAM!
THANK YOU ALL!
A few key UVic and BC websites for returning to campus in September for everyone!
52 iMacs (circa 2012-2013), Dual-Boot (WIN and iOS) that served students, staff, Instructors and Faculty SO WELL … and don’t owe us anything, are now on the way to their Forever Recycle Home!
And The CALL Facility is back to … mostly normal, as you can see the ‘Before‘ all the iMacs (& other miscellaneous recyclables!) were picked up and the … ‘After‘! And yes, those are NEW DESKS, TABLES AND FURNITURE! More presents are coming for September!
CALL Before iMacs Recycled
CALL Before iMacs Recycled
CALL After iMacs Recycled
And the huge mountain of tech has now been moved to their Forever (for now!) homes across campus! Thanks to ALLISON for organizing everything so we all knew … what would go where! YAY ALLISON!
Each workstation in CALL now has either a NEW DELL or a NEW MAC MINI! They will all be ready for September – so much ‘Behind the Scenes‘ is going on, so that we are ready for September!
And HSD was added to the mix for recycling cardboard, plastic and paper too!
HSD and more cardboard!
HSD Cardboard Pancakes
HSD Cardboard Sandwich
HSD Hallway of Cardboard
Thanks to Sage and Keanu for helping out make mountains out of cardboard molehills! YAY SAGE AND KEANU!
We are not done yet and there are more presents to unwrap and recycle the wrapping over the summer, in preparation for September! Stay tuned!
I did a previous post about Recycling in CALL, and have also included the same Gallery of photos here, to show HOW MUCH CARDBOARD is used when purchasing technology! One computer is lots … DOZENS ADDS UP TO ?QUITE A BIT OF CARDBOARD!
Later today, Monday June 14th, BC will announce the next phase of easing Covid requirements for the province!
And the ultimate question is … What’s Next for September? And there really is no firm answer yet. We have had Safe Work Plans in place for staff and students to use the Clearihue Computing Facilities classrooms on the 1st Floor, since September. As well as SWP for our offices too. That information is posted on the (locked) entry doors to the computing facilities, CLE A112.
“TO INFINITY …. AND BEYOND!“ or YOU GET TO CHOOSE THE NEXT JEOPARDY MOVIEQUOTES!
The NEXT JEOPARDY is already in the planning stages!! The Categories, such as “SkyNet”, “Altair 8800” and “Slide Rulers” will be my choices, but the Quotes will be suggestions from CHD Consultants!
I knew going in to the June Jeopardy this year … might … be a “Blast From MY Past”! And although many are well known Science Fiction movies … not so well known amongst our Consultants! 🙂
So next time, I will let ALL the CHD Consultants give me feedback on the movies quotes THEY want to try and guess … from THEIR generation! This is, to quote Robbie the Robot … “DANGER WILL ROBINSON! DANGER” time as I may not have seen any of the movies THEY have grown up with! LOL!
I created a Poll at MS:Office 365, using Forms, for all the Consultants to fill in. I guessed at some movies and also left room for ‘Others..’ and a text box for comments too! Not only did it refresh my skills at Polls (it had been a year!) but it will bring everyone together again and might even add a bit of competitiveness to Jeopardy next time.
And imagine the Consultants … the “Jeopary Shaming” if someone gets one wrong! OH, the horrors!
The actual Poll is below (screeen grabs) and each has a clickable link TO the Poll, but I have limited access to “Only people in my organization can respond“. Security reasons! A good test of settings too!
And it will eventually generate some stats and comments too, all part of Forms at MS:Office 365! Early results are in, below, but a long way to go! And if you haven’t noticed, I am a big fan of MS:Office 365! So much more is coming in the weeks and months to come! Make sure you check out the Microsoft Office 365 at UVic OAC Blog Page for all the latest stuff!
“DANGER WILL ROBINSON!“ or “I’m sorry Dave.
I’m afraid I can’t do that“ Famous Computer Quotes !
ANOTHER CALL JEOPARDY YESTERDAY FOR HELP DESK! The theme this time was ‘MEMES‘ and the movie quotes were all from famous SF computers, androids, robots, AI, replicants, ‘bots or even organics (people!) forthem!
Click On Jeopardy ‘MEMEs R US” to go to a PDF version in another Tab
I sure had fun creating this new updated version, which included all kinds of memes and .gifs that are Computer Help Desk related! So, for a new feature here, will identify EACH QUOTE in EACH CATEGORY below, with a link to the IMDB movie page too! And as most of them are potentially ‘older’ movies, many Consultants have not SEEN these awesome movies! So a quick way to go to EACH MOVIE that I referenced! I will call this .. CHDMDB for Computer Help Desk Movie Database!
(Click Character-for IMDB profile / on Movie/TV Show- more info)
Next Jeopardy (October 2021??) will involve Movie Quotes, again, for the categories, but … the CATEGORIES will be based on a Poll in Teams that I will create soon! So they will be more current i.e. released AFTER most of our Consultants were BORN! Some of the movies I referenced, some of the PARENTS of our CHD Consultants .. might not even have seen!
Almost every single day, there is news of a new security breach somewhere, and that includes Canada too. And just one aspect of computer security is using a VERY difficult to guess password or passphrase.
What is the difference? To make a long passphrase short … IS a password! Passphrases are longer and are often REQUIRED to be longer than the passwords that we have become familiar with.
And in addition, something called MFA, Multi-Factor Authentication. Basically TWO things you need to know or provide, in order to proceed securely to a UVic or other important site. Think of it as an extra lock on your way into your home, each lock needing a unique key. If you don’t have the first key, you are stopped. And if you don’t have the SECOND key, you are also stopped!
This is great news and will provide ADDITIONALand IMPROVEDsecurity for all of UVic and that means for ALL OF US! Check out, of all places, Wikipedia for a ‘Wikipedia’ explanation of (MFA) Multi-Factor Authentication.
So, the next client might not be swearing at you … they might be providing you with their PASSWORD! WHICH THEY SHOULDN’T DO!
Some fun and interesting links below about famous movie hacks and security!
With the help of all my fellow Penguins (Benguins too!) in The Tigloo (you know who you are!) I attempted a High Risk High Reward demo at our CHD meeting yesterday, while I was IN CALL!
AND IT WAS SO WORTH IT! Cool technology with CART2D2 (C2D2 for short) from myprevious post and … well, just some photos for now of the setup as I am working on documentation on how to set up C2D2 for mobile broadcasting and recording! SO COOL! TAK TAK PENGS!!!!
Instructor Station – Source of Video Side View of Setup Behind View of Setup Back View Other Side Student View of Screen Instructor Vantage Point
Above is the original video, shot from my iPhone SE, but with a twist. The original video is just me, slightly pushing C2D2 down the lower hallway, AWAYfrom myself, slowly. It took a few takes to get it to go relatively straight, and of course, slowly and safely!
I imported it into Photos like a normal media clip. Then exportedto the desktop of my iMac. Then I importedit into Final Cut Pro, edited out a few seconds at the beginning and end and then … used a built in FCP feature to ‘Reverse Clip‘ the video! Really, only a couple of clicks and it looks like C2D2 is coming … towards me under its own power! The only real ‘giveaway’ is if you listen real close, you might hear the tell tale sounds of a .. reverse clip audio effect!
Final Cut Pro ‘Reverse Clip’ Converted to GIF
Then I converted the new ‘reversed‘ MOVIE clip to a GIF using my favourite website, EZGIF.com! The result is above!
Then I added text with … you guessed it … EZGIF.com again! NOW it looks like I am using ‘The Force‘ to bring C2D2 towards myself! “CART … I AM YOUR DRIVER!“
Text Added to GIF
Then for even more editing, I cropped the GIF to get rid of the black borders and then resized it 150% too! And yeah, EZGIF.com again! See below!
Cropped GIF to Eliminate Black FrameEnlarged GIF by 150%
MORE
OAC WordPress Tips . . . . . . . or . . . CopyCatPost!
TIME for more OAC WordPress Hints and Tips! I have a previous post about OAC WordPress Tips here so this will be some new, brief ones that might save you some time or make your publishing a bit easier and more satisfying!
Copy Post
10)Copy a Post! If you have a previously published Post that is very similar to what you want to create in a NEW Post, then .. just Copy it, and edit out what you don’t want, keep what you want and start creating! That is what I did for THIS post, from my earlier post! Just click on Posts/All Posts, find the Post you want to ‘Copy’ and .. click on Copy! Rename it and you are off to the races!
Add Media to Library
9) Media Library Images – Simply dragany .GIF, .JPG, .PNG, .PDF into the .. Media Library! That is it! I have found that if you want to put a new image INTO your post, then SAVE your draft post FIRST. Then drag the new image resource(s) into the Media Library, then you can add them. If you drag them into the Media Library first, then try to place them in your post, they will not be visible .. until you update your new post.
Snipping Tool (WIN)Mac Screen Grab Keystrokes
8) Screen Capture to Media Library! Ah, if only a simple screen grab (Mac or WIN) could be simply .. taken and pasted into an OAC post. Nope! It must be saved as an accepted format (.jpg or .png) and then put into the Media Library. So Mac is (Command-Shift-4) and WIN (WIN-Shift-S) will give you a crosshair to capture a portion of your screen. Mac instantly makes it a file on the desktop (BONUS!) ready to put into your Media Library. WIN – I use the built in ‘Snipping Tool’ application, then I can edit it in Paint 3d, save it as a .png and then drag into my Media Library. A couple of extra steps, but still quite easy!
7) Small .GIFS are BETTER! I ran into a problem creating some .GIFs in a previous post. Turned out … the ORIGINAL .GIF files were simply TOO LARGE for OAC to animate! So I used ezgif.com to shrink them down to about 25% of original size and they worked fine after that!
Media Library Add NewInsert as URL
6) YouTube videos! Although I have tried to resize them, I can’t figure out how. So, you can insert them with the original URL copy/pasted where you want the video to be IN your Post, or copy/paste and Insert them through the Media Library/Insert from URL section. Both work! Neither can be resized! The trick to resize them is to do a screen grab of a frame. Then put that screen grab in the Media Library, then link it to the actual YouTube Video. Cludgy, but it works, such as at my Post about UVic’s YouTube Channel!
Captions Here NOW!Edit Image
5) Captions for Images! Once I discovered how to put a Caption BENEATH each image, I was off to the races! Adds a nice little touch to each image. AND you can also make it a clickable link to open in a new Tab to a site or even a larger image. It is basically anchored text to the image!
Adding the Caption can be done when you add a new image to the library or on the fly, by clicking on the inserted image, then on the Edit icon and then update the Caption field. It is THAT easy! I do NOT want to go back and edit EACH image, to include a Caption. So when I place one, and it does NOT have a caption, I update it .. and it is there for all the subsequent uses. It does not update older placed images, as far as I know.
Search my Media Library for ‘Capybara‘
4) Search your Media Library! I have … many … images in my Media Library! I should have been including Captions, ALT-Text and Descriptions initially but … did not know! About as simple a search as possible! Will find your criteria in any of the categories associated with your images (Alternative Text, Title, Caption, Description etc.) and even including the file name if you edit it BEFORE adding it to your Media Library. The image above is when I searched my own library for ‘Capybara‘.
shift-return (enter)
3) SINGLE SPACING! This is simple. Sometimes you want to separate a paragraph, image, text by a single line, not the default double when you hit Enter. Just hit SHIFT-ENTER (or RETURN) and … single space. Works especially well for formatting … poetry!
Paragraphs
2) Paragraph/Section Titles! You can use Paragraph and Headings throughout your Post! I use them for titles to YouTube videos and seemingly … out of the blue too!
with such amazing and incredible colleagues at The Computer Help Desk over the past … 500+ DAYS! Yes, it has been that long since we started working remotely, late in March of 2020!
Whatever CAN be recycled 
52 iMacs (circa 2012-2013), Dual-Boot (WIN and iOS) that served students, staff, Instructors and Faculty SO WELL … and don’t owe us anything, are now on the way to their Forever 
have grown up with! LOL!
(Click Character-for IMDB profile / on Movie/TV Show- more info)
What about the others? Can I help them?
So, the next client might not be swearing at you … they might be providing you with their PASSWORD! 
With the help of all my fellow Penguins (
