ASA Tech Tips and News: October 2024

Monday, October 14, 2024

Tech Tips and News for October 2024

Whew! it was a fast and BUSY summer here at ASA. But it was a good busy! Our "out with the old and in with the new" process for replacing classroom technology definitely kept the maintenance crews and me busy all summer long. Many thanks to Pat and Mike for taking down all those older projectors! As a result of all that activity, I'm only now catching up on all the Google updates that have taken place in the last four months. It seems there were a LOT of them! There were so many that I'll only include some of them here, and add the rest into next month's Tech Tips and News. Yes, you read that correctly, this blog will become a monthly issue. With all the tech additions in the past few years, there just isn't time for me to troll for tips and news on a regular basis, but I do want to keep you informed of all the updates in our various platforms. I'll try to just catch the highlights each month to share with you. Since October is also Cybersecurity Awareness Month, I've also included several Safety and Security tips.

7 Scenarios Where You Should Avoid Using Your Main Credit Card

7 Scenarios Where You Should Avoid Using Your Main Credit Card, from How-To Geek by Shan Abdul

In order to safely conduct business online, it is imperative that we all know when to enter our credit card info, and when not to.

What Is a Recovery Email, and Why Is It So Important?

What Is a Recovery Email, and Why Is It So Important? from How-To Geek by Oluwademilade Afolabi

Don't lose control of your email account.

The NSA Advises You to Turn Off Your Phone Once a Week - Here's Why

The NSA Advises You to Turn Off Your Phone Once a Week - Here's Why, from ZDNet by Lance Whitney

While this isn't a cure-all, it will help keep you and your information safe. Learn why, and what other steps you can take.

Want to Freeze Your Credit After the National Public Data Breach? Here's How

Want to Freeze Your Credit After the National Public Data Breach? Here's How, from CNET by Danni Santana

I resorted to this last spring after 3 data breach notifications in a 2 week span. I haven't regretted it.

How to Spot Scams, and What to Do If You Encounter One

How to Spot Scams, and What to Do If You Encounter One, from The Keyword by Laurie Richardson and Heather Adkins

This article covers scams in all forms: emails, phone and text, web browsing, what do to if you've been scammed, and there's even a quiz at the end.

Google Calendar: New Features Available for Embedded Calendars

You'll now have the option of embedding an interactive version of a Google Calendar on a website. These new features will include the ability to allow the calendar to be used with a screen reader, and keyboard shortcuts to navigate it more easily. Follow these instructions to embed your calendar with these new features.

Google Calendar: Additional Features for Appointment Scheduling

You may (or may not) remember that the Appointment Slots feature was replaced by Appointment Scheduling. They basically do the same thing by allowing you to set up blocks of time in your schedule where you can set up appointment slots and share the link with others. Others can then make an appointment with you by signing up for one of those appointment slots. This enhancement has added a couple of additional features, such as adding a custom recurrence, such as bi-weekly, and allowing bookers and co-hosts to add other guests. Visit the Help Center to learn more about creating an appointment schedule and customizing your appointment availability.

Google Drive: Automatic Digest for Shared Files

f you haven’t been active on Drive for 7 days and have multiple shared files that are unviewed, we’ll send you a reminder email that summarizes the files. This is particularly useful if you’re having a busy week or if you just got back to work after having time off. The digest email will include information about the unviewed files that were shared with you and a link to “See more activity” on the Drive Activity page.

Google Drive: Automatically Generate Captions for Videos

When you upload a video file in Google Drive, captions for the video will be automatically generated. These captions are automatically generated using speech recognition technology to transcribe the audio. This feature allows you to easily search for videos based on their content. If you need to add captions to any videos previously uploaded to Drive, you can do that manually. You can learn more about automatically generated captions here.

Gemini: Now Available As a Google Workspace App with More Data Protections

You may, or may not, have noticed that Gemini is now available as a Google Workspace for education app. By tapping on your app switcher (the waffle) in any Google service, you can select Gemini from the list of apps that appear. Google has stopped collecting data or "training" Gemini from Google Workspace for Education accounts. When you access Google's AI bot, Gemini, from your asagr.org or dogrschools.org account, your data will not be collected or shared, making it much more secure.

Gemini: Now Shows Related Links in Responses

When you search Google's AI bot, Gemini, it will now display links related to its responses. This will allow for faster fact checking and source citing.

Gemini: Personalize Gemini with Gems

Gems is a new tool for Google Gemini that will allow you to customize Gemini for your projects, brainstorms, guides, learning coach, writing editor, etc. You can use one of the premade Gems (Brainstormer, Career Guide, Coding Partner, Learning Coach, and Writing Editor, or you can create your own Gem for anything you'd like help with. Learn how to get started with Gems here.

Google Meet: Set Automatic Meeting Notes, Recordings and Transcripts from the Calendar Invite

If you're worried you might forget to create meeting notes, record a meeting or turn on automatic meeting transcripts, you can now set it and forget it when you create the Calendar invitation. Once the Meet begins, it will automatically record your meeting, create a transcript of the meeting and create meeting notes. If you have meetings that were created prior to this enhancement, you can go back and turn these features on for them by opening edit view for the appointment, clicking on the gear that appears next to the Join with Google Meet button, and selectimng the Meeting Records option. Learn more about using these features here.

Google Sheets: Introducing Conditional Notifications

Receiving notifications when a spreadsheet it edited is very helpful, but what if you only need to be notified when certain fields are edited? Even better, what if you need someone else to be notified when specific changes are made? Now you'll be able to refine sheets notifications in both ways. You can set rules to notify you or others when a range of cells changes value, and when a range of cells match a certain condition. For example, if Amanda only needs to see new attendance entries for the Lower Campus, and Angela only needs to be notified for new attendance entries for the Upper Campus, each of them could set those criteria and no longer receive notifications for every attendance entry. To set conditional notifications, open your spreadsheet, go to Tools > Conditional notifications > Add rule. You can also right-click directly on a spreadsheet and select Conditional notifications. Here are instructions for using Conditional Notifications in Sheets. This update should be available by mid-October.

Google Sheets: View Form Data as a Table

When a user creates a new sheet with Forms responses, Sheets will automatically open the responses as a table. A table in Sheets displays your data in a formatted and structured way. You can easily change a column type, sort, filter, and group information. You can even have more than one table in a sheet so you can highlight different information. Viewing data in a table does not alter the data in the sheet itself, it just customizes the view for you. Other viewers can customize their own tables without altering the way you see the data in the sheet or in your table. If you prefer to see the data in the sheet instead of in a table, you can tap the down arrow next to the table name, and select Revert to Unformatted Data. If you have an older form with a response sheet that doesn't open in a table, you can create a table for it by selecting Format > Convert to Table. Learn more about using tables in Google Sheets here.

What Caused the Great CrowdStrike-Windows Meltdown of 2024? History Has the Answer

What Caused the Great CrowdStrike-Windows Meltdown of 2024? History Has the Answer, from ZDNet by Ed Bott
A cautionary tale of when updates go bad.

Are You Ready for the End of Windows 10?

Are you aware that Windows will stop supporting Windows 10 on October 14, 2025? While that doesn't mean your Windows 10 computer will stop working, it does mean it will stop getting security and feature updates. This means you should not use your Windows 10 computer in any way that is connected to the internet (or on the ASA network) after 10/14/25 because it will be vulnerable to attack. So in the next year, your options are to upgrade your computer to Windows 11 (Windows has most likely been nagging you to do this in the past two years), or replace your computer if it cannot be updated to Windows 11. That being said, if you have a newer computer that Windows indicates cannot be upgraded, you can try one of these five options before support ends next year.

Monday, October 14, 2024

Safety and Security

Updates

News

Tips & Tutorials

What Caused the Great CrowdStrike-Windows Meltdown of 2024? History Has the Answer, from ZDNet by Ed BottA cautionary tale of when updates go bad.

What Caused the Great CrowdStrike-Windows Meltdown of 2024? History Has the Answer, from ZDNet by Ed Bott
A cautionary tale of when updates go bad.