Tech Tip Tuesdays

Tech Tip Tuesday: Join a Google Meet call from Docs, Sheets, or Slides

By May 31st 2022

From within Google Docs, Sheets, or Slides, you can now join a Google Meet call right in the same window. Students working on a group project, faculty discussing an assignment with students, or colleagues collaborating for work now have more convenient ways to work together.

Just click on the Google Meet icon next to the Share button to see your upcoming scheduled meetings, start a new meeting, or add a meeting code for an existing meeting. The meeting will open in a sidebar in the document you’re working on.

If you create a new meeting, Google Meet will provide you with a link you can share with others to join you.

The first time you use this feature in your browser, you will need to give permission for Google Docs to use your microphone and camera.

Screenshot of Google Docs dialog asking permission to use microphone and camera

You may also see a popup alerting you that you’re not presenting the document and giving you a link to share the document in the Meet.

Screenshot of an alert in Google Docs reading "You're not presenting in this call" and providing a link to share for others to collaborate on the document

You will also have the option to shrink the Meet panel using the Picture-in-picture feature, or to pop the Meet panel out to a separate tab in your browser.

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Tech Tip Tuesday: Unexpected Google Calendar Notifications

By May 24th 2022

Have you ever had a colleague or classmate tell you they got a notification for your Google Calendar event they weren’t part of? There are a couple of possible explanations, each with its own solution.

1. If you have granted another person at Allegheny permission to change and edit events in your Google Calendar, they may receive notifications like this. You can check by going to your Google Calendar and clicking on the Options menu (the three dots next to the calendar name):

image.png
Then choose Settings and sharing.
 
Scroll down to the section titled Share with specific people.If you see the other person’s name there, check to see what permissions they have. If they have either of the last two options in this list– Make changes to events or Make changes and manage sharing— that might explain why they’re receiving notifications:
Screenshot of the sharing options in Google Calendar
You can either remove those permissions, or let them know that they can ignore the notifications for events for which you haven’t sent them an invitation.
2. If they have subscribed to your calendar, they may also receive notifications, even without those permissions. In this case, the fix will need to be at their end. Here’s how they can fix it:
In Google Calendar, under Other calendars, if they see the name for your calendar, they can click on the Options menu using the same three dots, and then choose Settings:
image.png
They can then check under three sections of the settings — namely, Event notifications, All-day event notifications, and Other notifications. They can alter or delete their notification settings for your calendar from there.
Feel free to suggest topics for future Tech Tips you’d like to see!
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Tech Tip Tuesday: Phone Changes

By May 17th 2022

A black-and-white photo of an antique telephoneWith changes to personnel and office locations, sometimes uncertainty arises about how to handle phone setups.

Employees who move from one location on campus to another, and who will be keeping the same extension, can simply take their existing phone with them to their new location. When it’s plugged in, the extension stays the same even though it’s now in a different building. LITS does ask to be notified when a phone moves to a different building, so we can update records for emergency calls to be routed correctly.

If for some reason their extension needs to change, or if a new employee is coming into an office that already has a phone, please notify LITS so we can update the phone setup to reflect the new extension and caller ID.

In the event of such changes, we just ask you to open a Web Help Desk ticket with the Request Type “Phone”, and an LITS technician will follow up with you.

Finally, in the event that there is a phone that will no longer be used, please let LITS know.

 Today’s Tech Tip was suggested by an Allegheny College employee. Feel free to suggest topics for future Tech Tips you’d like to see!

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Tech Tip Tuesday: Preserving Your Work Beyond Graduation

By May 3rd 2022

Silhouetted image of five people in graduation robes and caps against a sunset sky.
Image: “The Graduates” by Luftphilia.

With graduation fast approaching, LITS would like to remind graduating seniors: you can hold on to some of the content you’ve created in their time here at Allegheny. Since your Allegheny account is not permanent, LITS recommends that you take steps to preserve your content. We’ve created a step-by-step guide on how to migrate your content to a personal Gmail account. You can choose to migrate information from various Google services, such as Google Docs, email messages, and Google Calendar. It’s best to begin the process early, so that you have time to ensure you have what you need.

And if you haven’t already done so, don’t forget to submit your Senior Project to Allegheny’s online Senior Project archive!

Feel free to suggest topics for future Tech Tips you’d like to see!

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Image used under a Creative Commons CC BY-NC 2.0 license.

Tech Tip Tuesday: Show Trimmed Content in Gmail

By April 26th 2022

Today’s Tech Tip was suggested by an anonymous user. Feel free to suggest topics for future Tech Tips you’d like to see!

Gmail has many useful features, including conversation threading, email scheduling, powerful searching, and labels. But sometimes a feature can cause confusion.

One such feature is the way that Gmail will trim the content of an email if it contains text you’ve already seen in the same conversation. This can be a big help in a conversation thread with lots of replies, as it keeps every email message from becoming long and unwieldy. But sometimes it’s helpful to see that information–especially since sometimes the trimmed content includes the sender’s signature.

If you feel like Gmail has trimmed a message you’d like to see more of, look for three dots at the end of the message. When you hover your mouse over them, a little popup will say “Show trimmed content.”

Screenshot showing the "Trimmed Content" mouseover in Gmail

Clicking on those three dots will expand the hidden content so you can see it in full.

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Tech Tip Tuesday: Safety Check in Google Chrome

By April 12th 2022

Google Chrome now has a feature called “Safety check”, which can help make sure your browser and passwords are as secure as possible. To access the Safety check:

  1. At the top right, click More  Settings.
  2. Click Privacy and Security .
  3. Under Safety check click Check now.

The results will give you information on whether Chrome is up to date, if you have any saved passwords that you might want to double-check, whether standard or enhanced browsing protection is enabled, how well protected your browser is from potentially harmful extensions, and whether Chrome can detect any harmful software on your device.

Screenshot of sample Safety check results in Google Chrome

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Tech Tip Tuesday: Mention Another User in a Google Doc

By March 29th 2022

You can now mention another user in Google Docs within the document itself. Previously, this was only possible within a comment.
When another user is mentioned, you can hover over their name for information about them and suggested actions like adding that person to Contacts or reaching out via email. This is the same information you see today when hovering over a user’s name in other Google Workspace apps, such as Gmail or Calendar.
Note that mentioning someone in a document will not send them a notification. Additionally, if you mention a user who does not have access to the doc, you’ll receive a prompt with sharing suggestions. You can share the document at that time or decline and use the regular Docs sharing function when the time is right.
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Tech Tip Tuesday: Appointment Slots in Google Calendar

By March 22nd 2022

Google Calendar can be a useful tool in managing all the classes, meetings, office hours, and activities in your schedule. One use for it is to set up appointment slots that people can use to request an appointment with you. You can use it for in-person appointments, or appointments via Google Meet. This video from Señor Taylor gives a quick introduction:

LITS has also prepared a Google Calendar Appointment Slots Quick Guide for our Allegheny community.

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Tech Tip Tuesday: Multiple Desktops

By March 15th 2022

Multiple desktops are great for helping you focus, for keeping unrelated ongoing projects organized, or setting up one desktop to share during a presentation while still having access to others. Think of it as Alt+Tab on steroids–switching not only between individual apps, but between entire groups and layouts of your desktop on your computer.

In a previous Tech Tip, we posted about how to use multiple desktops in Windows 10. This feature is also available on Chromebooks (where it’s called a “desk”), and on Macs using the Mission Control function.

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