UW-IT continues to expand the core UW Google Apps service (Email, Calendar, Docs, Sites, and Talk) by enabling new apps you can choose to activate. Those added recently include Chrome Sync, FeedBurner, iGoogle, Latitude, Map Maker, News, and Places. Earlier this year, Blogger, Google+, Google Code, Picasa, Voice, YouTube, and more were added. All undergo a UW enterprise risk review process first. These apps are not covered by the existing UW contract with Google that ensures certain student data protections. Support is provided by Google. Get more information.

The 2012 Accessible Technology Webinar Series seeks to increase awareness of the importance of providing equal access to information tools used in the workplace and social media. The next Webinar is "21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act" on June 12; register online by June 11. You also can see upcoming Webinars—on accessibility of Web authoring, mobile, and more—and access the archived sessions. This free series is coordinated by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) National Network.

The UW Information Navigator (UWIN) Web page is being retired on April 30. Originally designed as a collection of information services for UW faculty and staff including news, library catalogs, and reference tools, and home to the first UW Webcam images of Red Square, the page is no longer being actively maintained as new Web pages have been developed. You can now visit the Faculty & Staff Insider pages for the latest UW news, information, and links for faculty and staff. Other sources of information include the UW home page and UW Today.

To help shape the future of MyUW, your personalized portal to UW resources, UW students are invited to share how they use it and how they think it can be improved. Please take the short, 10-minute survey now or no later than January 27. Feel free to forward the link to your classmates.

For World Usability Day, describe your worst User Experience meltdown and how it could have been avoided for your chance to win prizes from Human Factors International (HFI). Submit your story in 100-300 words by November 4 to win a Kindle Touch™, the new book 100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People, and have your story posted on the HFI Web site.

[NOTE: This survey closed August 30.] Please help us improve IT Connect by taking a one-minute online survey to provide input on how we can make the site better for you. UW students, faculty, and staff also can volunteer to participate in one-hour focus groups on improving IT Connect; get more details and let us know you are interested by using the online focus group volunteer form. Your input is appreciated.

Faced with reduced support staff last fall, the School of Social Work faculty took control of their own course Web site content. By leveraging UW-hosted Catalyst CommonView, and with a little help from UW-IT for customized training sessions, faculty created their own online course materials for 61 classes. Learn how the School and its two-person IT team created this successful model of sustainable course support in this Profile of Technology Use.

Have you searched the UW Course Catalog, used Employee Self-Service or MyFinancial.desktop, or filed grades via Catalyst GradeBook? These tools rely on UW Web Services, supported by UW-IT, that provide a bridge to the institutional data used by these applications. Learn more, browse the more than 20 services, and submit suggestions on the UW Web Services portal, with its new, easy-to-use interface.

With UW Groups you can manage lists of team members and collaborators in a single place. Now, if you can view the membership of a UW Group, you can use UW Groups in Catalyst Tools in WebQ, QuickPoll, Collect It, CommonView, GoPost, ShareSpaces, etc. You can also now activate UW Groups for use in UW Google Apps to share Google documents, sites, calendars, and other resources with members of UW Groups.

Starting March 1, the amount of disk space allocated to faculty and staff will be split out by service: UW Email—also known as UW Deskmail—(5 GB), Streaming Media (3 GB), Web Publishing (1 GB), and Linux Shell (1 GB). Shared accounts will have 1 GB space for each service, except for Streaming Media (3 GB). You will be able to manage your allocation and get additional space charged to a UW budget number beginning July 1, 2011 via the self-service Manage Your UW NetID Resources Web page. See details in IT Connect.

Do you need to share audio, video, or applications with multiple participants? Sign up for Adobe Connect, a Flash-based virtual meeting room, available for a fee through UW-IT. Connect with up to 100 participants for e-learning, collaboration, Web meetings, screen sharing, and more.

Search the UW's institution-wide policies, orders, rules, and by-laws on the new online UW Policy Directory. This new, easy-to-use site replaces the University Handbook and incorporates the Administrative Policy Statements site and UW Washington Administrative Code (WAC) rules, as well as provides a starting place for finding other UW policy resources. Read more in UW Today.

On MyUW, new Academics, Admissions, and Student Finances tabs have replaced the old Student tab. Students now have easy access to these essential UW services, with the information organized to support key activities of both current and prospective students. See What's in This MyUW Upgrade for details and tips.

A redesigned UW home page is now up and feedback is welcome. For a quick guide to the new pages you'll find, what pages have been redesigned, and what's still to come, visit the UW Web redesign blog. You'll find tips there about MyUW, and information about new tabs and sections.

Custom search results are now possible on the main UW Web site for general information that’s of very broad interest, such as IMA hours and the UW World Series schedule. Go to the UW home page (http://uw.edu) and type “world series” or “ima” in the search box to see what a custom search result looks like. If you have an idea for a custom search result that’s of university-wide interest, submit your suggestion to the Marketing Web Team using this form.

Caroline Strömberg, UW Assistant Professor of Biology and Curator of Paleobotany in the Burke Museum, is involved in developing GrassPortal. Grasses have a major influence on climate and form the cornerstone of food production. GrassPortal will integrate grass species names, descriptions, distribution, and ecological data with evolutionary information in a Web interface, providing researchers and students with tools for interacting, discovering, and extracting information.