Helpdesk News

04/02/2008 - Delays in E-mail Delivery

The university's e-mail system is experiencing some delays in delivery due to increased activity on the anti-virus/anti-spam servers. The Office of Information Technology is working to address this issue and restore service to normal levels.

Thank you for your patience.

02/25/2008 - IT Alert - Phishing Scam

There have been numerous reports of the campus community receiving a Phishing e-mail using the upgrade of a website as a pretext. Due to this scam and other Phishing attacks everyone should beware of messages that ask you for personal account information via e-mail, telephone number, or by visiting sites to divulge personal information. As a general rule you should never respond to any e-mail and give out your personal information. If you have any questions please contact the IT Helpdesk at 662-915-5222 or helpdesk@olemiss.edu.

01/29/2008 - myOleMiss Portal to replace Online Services

On Friday, February 1, Online Services will be replaced by a portal environment called myOleMiss that features a new look and updated navigation. For more information on the conversion to myOleMiss click here. For further questions contact the IT Helpdesk at 662-915-5222 or helpdesk@olemiss.edu.

12/14/2007 - Eudora SSL Certificate Update

For instructions for updating the SSL certificate in Eudora view this PDF document. Eudora SSL (80KB)

12/10/2007 - E-mail System Upgrade

Beginning at 7:00 AM on Friday, December 14, the university's e-mail system will be completely unavailable as it is migrated to a new server and the current WebMail application is upgraded.

E-mail and WebMail service will be restored by 8:00 AM on Monday, December 17.

Please note that during this time period, no one will be able to send or receive messages using an olemiss.edu account.

There will be no access to WebMail, and you will not be able to access your olemiss.edu account using an e-mail client such as Outlook, Eudora, or Thunderbird.

Valid e-mails to your olemiss.edu account should remain on the sending server long enough to be re-sent once the Ole Miss system is available. At that time you should receive any e-mail sent to you during this period.

Your folders and messages on the current WebMail system will be migrated. Please sign into the new WebMail once it becomes available and verify your information is correct.

Any current forwarding or vacation settings will not be migrated. You will need to reset these once service is restored.

If you use Eudora, you will need to update your SSL settings as directed when you first connect to your olemiss.edu account.

This e-mail upgrade will allow the increase of default quotas from the current 5 MB to 300 MB for faculty/staff and 100 MB for students. The updated WebMail will offer several new features, including the ability to forward e-mail and set a vacation message.

For more information, contact the IT Helpdesk at 915-5222 or helpdesk@olemiss.edu.

08/10/2007 - Helpdesk Store Opening Tuesday 8/14

The IT Helpdesk will be opening the "Helpdesk Store" on Tuesday, August 14, 2007. This store will feature both hardware and software. For more information see the Helpdesk Store website at: http://hdstore.olemiss.edu.

07/09/2007 - Windows Vista and Office 2007 Training

The use of Windows Vista and Office 2007 is becoming more prevalent on campus. Due to the many changes these updates bring, we have put together information pages on Windows Vista and Office 2007. IT is also offering several training sessions for Windows Vista and the most common Office 2007 programs.

• Windows Vista Information Page
• Office 2007 Information Page
• Windows Vista and Office 2007 Training Sessions

06/01/2007 - Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack

Microsoft Office 2007 introduces new file format defaults (.docx, .pptx, .xlsx). In order to open these files in older versions of Microsoft Office, you must download the free Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack. With the new version of Microsoft Office, you can also save to PDF by downloading the Save as PDF Plug-In.

• Windows File Format Converter
• Windows Save as PDF Plug-In
• Mac OSX File Format Converter

05/04/2007 - Outlook 2007 Mail Setup Instructions

We now have the instructions for setting up Outlook 2007 (along with other clients) for use with your Ole Miss e-mail account at http://www.olemiss.edu/email/.

04/24/2007 - Symantec AntiVirus for Windows VIsta

We now have the latest version of Symantec AntiVirus available for Windows Vista, Windows XP, and Windows 2000. Please see our Virus Removal Page for the link to download Symantec and other useful anti virus/spyware programs.

03/15/2007 - Web Server Upgrade

The campus web server is being upgraded this week. During this period, some access to the server will be temporarily restricted. For more information, please click here.

03/09/2007 - Daylight Savings Time Updates

Daylight Savings Time begins and ends earlier this year. Your computer must be updated to handle this change. For more information about this, see our Daylight Savings Time Update page.

2/20/2007 - HOWTO: Retrieve Your Employee Payroll Stub Online

Beginning in March, employees of the University of Mississippi will no longer receive paper copies of their payroll stubs. These payroll stubs will be available online only. For instructions on how to retrieve your payroll stub, please follow the steps in our HOWTO: Retrieve Your Employee Payroll Stub Online form (PDF 634KB).

1/19/2007 - Mail Server Maintenance

Maintenance is scheduled on the campus e-mail servers for Friday, 1/19/07. When the maintenance is complete, you may experience issues connecting to the University's outgoing mail server (mail.olemiss.edu).

If you have problems sending mail after the maintenance period has expired, please click here and perform the instructions to resolve your problem.

12/13/2006 - Sunset and WebMail Unavailable

Sunset, the campus e-mail pop server, and Webmail will be unavailable from 7am until 9am on Wednesday, December 20, while we perform maintenance on the server. During this downtime, access to WebMail and pop.olemiss.edu will not be possible, resulting in e-mail clients such as Outlook and Eudora returning an error message. This will not affect mail.olemiss.edu; therefore, e-mails can be sent during this downtime.

12/07/2006 - WebMail Account Maintenance

We are in the process of "clearing" out WebMail accounts for former students, faculty, and staff. According to the account policy, these accounts are only guaranteed for 1 month after your affiliation with the University ends. If you are unable to log into your account and are no longer affiliated with the University, your account has likely been disabled. For more information and assistance, please contact the Helpdesk at (662) 915-5222 or send us an e-mail at: helpdesk@olemiss.edu.

12/07/2006 - Blackboard Unavailable [12/12 - 12/17]

Blackboard will be unavailable beginning at 5 AM on Tuesday, December 12, to allow an upgrade of the system. It is anticipated this upgrade may take 5 to 6 days to complete. The new version of Blackboard should be available for use by Monday, December 18. Please send any questions or concerns to blackboard@olemiss.edu.

11/30/2006 - Security Flaws Found in Symantec AntiVirus and Microsoft Windows

A new 'bot' named W32.Spybot.ACYR has been compromising certain machines by exploiting a flaw in Symantec AntiVirus and Microsoft Windows. These flaws have been fixed by the latest updates issued by Symantec and Microsoft. To ensure you have the latest updates, please make sure your Windows system is patched by selecting "Start", then "All Programs", then "Windows Update". To manually update Symantec Antivirus, click the yellow shield in your task bar and select "Live Update" then follow the prompts to download and install the latest updates.

11/06/2006 - *UPDATED* Outgoing Mail Problems

The University has been experiencing some issues with it's outgoing mail server throughout the day. It seems that the problem has been resolved, however due to the large number of messages in the outgoing queue, there will be some delays in receiving messages that were sent today. If you continue to experience any problems, please contact the IT Helpdesk at : (662) 915-5222.

10/25/2006 - Internet Explorer Update

Microsoft has released the first major update to it's Internet Explorer Web browser in years. It will be marked as an automatic update on November 1st, and will be installed on any Windows XP machine with Automatic Updates turned on. Though IE7 is an improvement of it's predecessor, some Web sites may not render correctly with it.

If you wish to block the automatic update of IE7, you can download the blocker tool here. If you have any problems or questions regarding the use of this tool, please call the IT Helpdesk at (662) 915-5222.

10/17/2006 - Eudora Updates

Eudora recently released an update to their popular E-mail program for Windows and Apple's OS X operating systems. To download the latest free versions (7.1 for Windows / 6.2.4 for Mac), go to the Helpdesk Free Downloads page. Qualcomm also lowered the price of the Eudora Premium version to $19.95. You can purchase the full (add-free) version from their website eudora.com

09/15/2006 - Updated E-mail SSL Certificate

We have recently updated the SSL Certificate on the e-mail server. It seems that people using Eudora are unable to check their e-mail without approving this certificate. To approve this certificate in Eudora, perform the following steps:

• Click on Tools, then go to Options.
• Click the Checking Mail option on the left pane.
• From the Checking Mail options, click on the Last SSL Info button.
• You will now be prompted with a Certificate Information Manager window. Click the Certificate Information Manager BUTTON at the bottom of this window.
• Click the "Add to Trusted" button.

This should resolve your issue! Try checking your e-mail again. If you still have problems, please give us a call at (662) 915-5222.

08/19/2006 - Dell Battery Recall

Dell has identified a potential issue associated with certain batteries sold with most of Dell's laptop brands. Under rare conditions, it is possible for these batteries to overheat, which could pose a risk of fire. Dell is offering to replace all batteries affected. To see if your laptop battery is affected and for more information on the recall, see Dell's Battery Return Program page.

08/14/2006 - Critical Windows Vulnerabilities

Microsoft revealed the existence of a critical vulnerability in it's Microsoft Windows operating system. Users of Windows 2000/XP/2003 are urged to perform Windows Updates to ensure they receive the proper security patches. For more information, see our IT Security page.

07/20/2006 - NOTICE to Incoming Students

Antivirus / Antispyware Software - The University of Mississippi offers FREE Symantec AntiVirus software to all students. The Helpdesk has also compiled a list of trusted and effective spyware removal programs. For links to these downloads, see our Virus Removal Page.

Microsoft Office - Microsoft offers educational discounts to students for its Office product suites. For access to these discounts (and others), please see the e-academy software page.

Computer Hardware - Many computer vendors (including Apple, Dell, and Gateway) offer educational discounts on computer hardware. See our IT Partners page for the direct links to these education stores.

06/01/2006 - WebMail Quotas

There are many users who have exceeded the maximum allowed e-mail quota. If you receive an e-mail warning you about your INBOX usage exceeding the maximum storage limit, please see out Webmail Quota page for more information.