The College of Arts and Sciences Computing Services Office was founded in the fall of 1992.  Our mission is to provide dedicated Information Technology support services to the faculty and staff of the College.

Located on the third floor of 438 College Street, the Computing Services Office consists of three full-time professional support staff.

Online Request	http://footprints.uvm.edu/ashelp.html
Web	http://www.uvm.edu/artsandsciences/computingsvs
Email	a-s.computing@uvm.edu
Telephone	(802)656-7971
Fax	(802) 656-4529
Mailing	UVM, College of Arts and Sciences Computing Services Office 438 College Street, Third Floor Burlington, VT 05405

Is This Email Legit?

30 April 2012, 3:11 pm

Is this email legitimate or a hoax?  This is the single most frequently asked question we have.  The answer is almost always no but people still ask and occasionally one of our clients will fall for a scam and end up with a compromised account.

The basic rule of thumb should be: if you want to ask someone about a particular email, then chances are the email is a scam and you should just delete it.

In general here’s what to look for:

• Is the email coming from a UVM email address?  If not, it’s fake.
• If there is a link in the email, does the link appear to be going to a UVM website (i.e. does the host name end in “uvm.edu”)?  If not, it’s fake.
• Does the link in the email go to same place that the email says it does (e.g. the link says “www.uvm.edu” but actually goes somewhere else).  If it doesn’t, it’s fake.
  You do not have to click the link to find out where it’s actually going.  Instead you can right click (control click under MacOS) and select “Copy Link Location”, then you can paste the link into any web browser and “see where it’s going” before actually clicking.
• If you do click the link does the site ask you for personal information (account and password, or worse, SS#)? If yes, it’s fake.
• Does the email threaten dire measures if you don’t comply?  If yes, it’s probably fake.
  Any security measure imposed by UVM (e.g. expiring your UVM netID every 365 days), will not be executed without ample warning (two weeks at least) and can always be reversed.

Here is an ebay website on the subject:

http://pages.ebay.com/education/spooftutorial/spoof_2.html

Here’s another:

http://www.antiphishing.org/consumer_recs.html

MacOS X Users: It is now safe to go back into the water, 10.7.3 update

12 March 2012, 9:30 am

Greetings-

For those running MacOS X Lion, aka 10.7, it is now safe to install the 10.7.3 update.  Apple switched from the context sensitive Software Updates version of the update (which is supposed to only install the components of the update that your computer needs) to the “Combo” version which contains everything for all currently supported Mac hardware.  This makes for a bigger update, but a safer one.

Please plan to allow enough time for the update to download, connect yourself to the fastest network connection possible and for those with Macbooks, connect your Magsafe AC Power supply before installing.

If you are not running a Mac, or are not running MacOS 10.7 (Lion) please disregard this message.

MacOS users: 10.7.3 update is out, install at your own risk

2 February 2012, 3:23 pm

If you do not have a Macintosh computer and are running OS X version 10.7, this article does not pertain to you.  Please keep moving folks, nothing more to see here.

Macintosh users with the most recent version of OS X, 10.7, aka “Lion”, there is an updated version of the OS that adds some language support and claims to fix a few outstanding bugs.  Normally we recommend that Mac users install updates as they become available, but not this time.

Apparently there are enough people running into networking, and application crashing, problems that CNet has an article on the subject:

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-57370469-263/os-x-10.7.3-update-causing-cui-interface-artifacts/

My advice would be to wait for an update to this update before installing.  The fixes described in the release notes for 10.7.3 will not improve the lives of most people anyway, so upgrading is not worth the risk of instability at this time.

The advice that the Cnet article gives for preventing the issues from occurring (which is not guaranteed to work please note) is pretty much what should be standard practice for all MacOS users:  make a backup, fix disk permissions using Disk Utility, download and install the Combo Fix version of the update rather than installing through Software Update.  Especially if you are an “early adopter” who installs everything as soon as it comes out, it’s a good idea to always follow the above routine.

Since we image our Macs with our own image, booting to the Lion restore partition is not an option for you should something go seriously wrong.  Instead you will have to bring the machine to us to be rebuilt.

CAS Computing Services