Contents of this tutorial

 

  • Virus protection under Windows
  • Printing under windows
  • Connecting to Rice wireless network
  • List of useful software

 

Virus Protection under windows

 

Let’s face it, some people have way to much time on their hands and they spend it trying to figure out how to crash your computer and in general cause you as much pain and misery as possible.  As a university, Rice has a relatively large computer network and as such is a target for some of these individuals.  Chances are that during your time here your computer will be infected at least once by some virus or other.  To prevent this and/or to minimize damage from infection you need virus protection. 

 

Computers administered by the IT department are taken care of automatically but any machine that you administer yourself, such as your home computer or a laptop, needs to have antivirus software installed.  As a student in Rice University, Statistics Department you can get McAfee VirusScan Enterprise Edition 7.1 antivirus program.  You can get it at https://management.owlnet.rice.edu/swdist/windows/virusscan-enterprise/.  You will be required to provide your UNIX username and password to authenticate your affiliation with Rice University. 

 

Once installed VirusScan will continuously check the files you are accessing, including emails and websites, against a list of known virus and Trojan profiles.  If you do not want this feature on, for example when you are defragging your hard drive, you can turn it off by right-clicking on the VirusScan icon in the bottom-right corner of your screen (on you taskbar) and selecting “Disable on-access Scan”.

 

If you suspect that you have a virus but the usual scan has not picked it up or if you think you may have gotten on while the VirusScan software was disabled/non-installed you may initiate a forced “On-Demand” scan by right clicking on the VirusScan shield icon and selecting “On Demand scan”.  You will be taken to the following dialog box, where you will be able to change any of the scanning options you want (although default ones work very well).  Once viruses and/or Trojans a found, they will be cleaned from the files they infected and if that fails the infected files can be quarantined so you can delete them later.

 

 

One thing to note, if you suspect that your Rice machine has been infected by a virus and your VirusScan software cannot detect it, yet you are experiencing a sudden drop in the responsiveness of your machine or constant e-mails from angry M.D. Anderson mail servers saying that they received an infected e-mail from you (even though you’ve never sent one), the best thing to do is to notify the IT department via problem.  If they are too busy to fix the problem, when these viruses attack they are extra swamped, they will let you know what to do so you can fix it yourself.

 

Printing under windows

 

In order to use one of the printers in Duncan Hall you will need to be part of the Engineering Domain, meaning you need to have username and password for your PC Engineering account.   You should already have one, but if you don’t you can apply for one by emailing problem@rice.edu.  If your machine is administered by the IT department they will take care of it, however if you administer your own machine or bring one to school (e.g. a laptop) you will need to create a new account.  Note that the account name and password on your personal machine would have to match your Engineering domain username and password. 

 

The steps for setting up printers discussed below apply only to the machine physically connected to the Rice network, through either the wireless or Ethernet connection.  To install a new printer go to Start ® Settings ® Printers and Faxes.  Choose to install a network printer and Browse for one until you find the appropriate printer. 

 

 

The following are the printers that can be used by the Department of Statistics Students:

  • Black and White printer:       dh2093
  • Color printer:                      dh2093

 

 

 

 

You can also install a printer by going to Start ® Run and typing “\\engr-pdc” and selecting the printer you wish to install.

 

 

If you have appropriate privileges an installation process should begin.

 

Connecting the Rice Wireless Network

 

What is it?

 

Duncan Hall along with several other buildings on campus supports wireless networks.  This means that users with wireless network cards can connect to and use the Rice University computer network as if they were hardwired to it.  Admittedly the speed is slower but not in any noticeable fashion.  This is perhaps very useful for personal laptops, because the process of connecting to the network is so easy and the speed of connection is so good.

 

How to get connected to the Wireless network

 

In order to connect to Rice University wireless network you will need a wireless network card.  These are not provided by the University and are not paid for, so you will have to buy one on your own if you want your laptop to use one.  Rice University wireless network supports most WLAN standards but the preferred ones are 802.11b and 802.11g.  A good description of the WLAN standards can be found at http://compnetworking.about.com/cs/wireless80211/a/aa80211standard.htm. 

 

The newer 802.11g standard would probably be best but more expensive.  Both of the standards mentioned above have good signal strength and good speed, so when buying one you should just make sure (or ask the salesperson to make sure) that the wireless network card you are getting conforms to one of these standards.

 

The process of installation for the wireless cards is dependent on the brand of the card you buy, but unless otherwise specified you can always follow these steps:

 

  • Turn off your machine
  • Plug in the wireless card (on a laptop it will usually go into the PCI slot)
  • Turn on your machine
  • Your Windows Operating System should detect the new hardware and prompt you to provide drivers for it.  Follow the onscreen instructions and provide the drivers from the CD or a diskette that came with the wireless card.

 

After the wireless card is installed the easiest way to connect to the wireless network is to have the IT department do it for you (through problem@rice.edu) but if you would like to do it yourself follow these steps (note the following is for advances users and will not be in much detail).

 

  • Go to Start ® Settings ® Network Connections and pick the connection supported by your wireless card.
  • Setup your TCP/IP protocol to use DHCP by selecting “Internet Protocol (TCP/IP)” and clicking Properties.

 

 

  • Open your Internet browser.  It should automatically go to http://register.rice.edu/.  If that didn’t happen (and you can connect to the internet) change the URL manually.  You should see something like…

 

 

  • At this point follow the instructions on the page to register your card with Rice DHCP host and you will be granted access to the wireless network.  Note that you have to be in the building in order to get this done.

 

 

List of useful software

 

While at Rice you will probably use many software packages, both academic and non-academic (such as antiviruses).  Below is a list of useful software and their availability.

 

The following are free:

 

  • Any Microsoft Development tool, which includes compilers such as C++, Java, Visual Basic, MS Visual Studio, C#, etc.
  • S-Plus (either through the IT department or through the department of Statistics)
  • R statistical package (R-Gui for windows) available for download at http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/languages/R/CRAN/
  • Mathematica via Rice Site License (you’ll have to contact IT department)
  • Scientific Workplace via Rice Site License (you’ll have to contact IT department)
  • McAfee VirusScan 7.1

 

The following have to be paid for, either by you or your advisor:

 

  • SAS
  • UEdit32 (a very powerful text editing tool under Windows that rivals many of the text editors previous found only on UNIX)