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Time for backups

Friday, February 27th, 2015

The past week we’ve seen how easy it is to lose something, whether it’s property or important information. It remains crucial to have a backup plan – literally.

To ensure you have peace of mind, make a habit of backing up your data on a regular basis. Choose one day a week when things are a little less chaotic than usual, maybe a Friday and make an appointment in your diary to do a weekly backup.

Try not to overwrite your previous backup. Rather make consecutive copies in various folders on your external hard drive or on your network space and name each with the particular day’s date. If any of the documents become corrupt for some reason, you can always fall back on a previous version.

For official, university or work-related documents, your safest backup choice would be your network drive (usually the h-drive) or the departmental network drive (usually the g-drive). You have 1GB at your disposal to backup your most critical documents. At an extra cost of R10-00 per 1GB this space can also be increased. This network space is also available via the web at storage.sun.ac.za if you find yourself away from the SU network.

The departmental drive can be used for files used by more than one person and 15GB is allocated to each department. SharePoint can also be used by groups for sharing documents.

If you choose to have your data closer at hand, get yourself an external hard drive or even dvd’s (although the amount of data you can save on dvd is a bit limited). Just ensure that these devices are stored somewhere else (not also in your office) or in a safe. If confidential, US documents are kept on an external hard drive, files have to be protected with a password or encrypted. Keep in mind that if you DO lose the password, not even IT can salvage your data.

Never save important data on a flashdrive – it’s sole function is for transporting data from one device to another and is not a dependable medium for backup. If you do save data on it, make sure you have an additional backup method as well.

Regularly check that the medium on which you made your backup is still in working order and you’re able to access your documents. For the same reason use more than one backup medium, for example your network space AND an external hard drive.

Lastly cloud storage can be used, but ONLY for private information. No academic or sensitive information is to be saved on the cloud. Read more on cloud storage in our previous articles.

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Posted in Research, Security | 1 Comment »

MATLAB in HPC cluster on campus

Friday, February 27th, 2015

Since the second semester of 2014, MATLAB has become available in the HPC cluster on campus, known as Rhasatsha.

The Engineering Faculty Board has kindly agreed to sponsor the purchase of a MATLAB Distributed Compute Server (MDCS) license for 16 MATLAB workers (version R2014a). This facility allows computational jobs, written in MATLAB, to be run in the HPC cluster in a manner of ways. Those of you familiar with MATLAB will find the facility quite friendly.

If you have MATLAB installed on your PC or laptop, you will require also the Parallel Compute Toolbox, in order to access the MDCS on Rhasatsha from your MATLAB client session on your PC or laptop. Interactive, as well as non-interactive jobs are supported.

In particular, when you have a highly parallel application, MDCS provides support for up to 16 concurrent threads to run, speeding up execution. The MDCS configuration has been prepared by Dr J P Barnard of Process Engineering, and Mr Charl Moller of IT.

You may find more information here:

Rhasatsha, http://hpc1.sun.ac.za/

Yearly registration to use Rhasatsha,  https://www0.sun.ac.za/hpc/index.php?title=HOWTO_register

Cost to use Rhasatsha, R1200 per year.

Cost to use MDCS is calculated pro-rata on total license renewal cost. Please, contact Dr Barnard.

MDCS, http://www.mathworks.com/products/distriben/

Dr J P Barnard, jbarnard@sun.ac.za

Mr C Moller, cwmoller@sun.ac.za

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eResearch Africa Workshop

Wednesday, November 12th, 2014

azure-researchMicrosoft Research is delighted to offer two no-cost training workshops as part of eResearch Africa 2014 at the University of Cape Town on November 27 and 28th, 2014. This is part of our Microsoft Azure for Research programme. (http://www.azure4research.com)

eResearch Africa brings together practitioners and researchers for a stimulating week to share ideas and exemplars on new information centric research capabilities. eResearch is focused on how information and communications technologies help researchers to collect, manage, share, process, analyse, store, find, and re-use information. –

See more at: http://www.eresearch.ac.za/overview-14#sthash.93n5rdj7.dpuf
There are two separate one-day workshops, you can apply for either one, or both:

– Thursday 27 November. Microsoft Azure for Research tutorial that will cover websites, virtual machines, cloud storage, scale-out computing, and visualisation. You will learn how cloud computing can accelerate your research. To register for this course go to: http://aka.ms/Azure4ResearchZA

– Friday 28 November. Microsoft Azure Machine Learning for Research where you will learn how to create, test, evaluate and publish machine learning predictive analytics easily, all in the cloud. To register for this course go to: http://aka.ms/Azure4ResearchML-ZA

Attendees will be able to access Microsoft Azure on their own laptop during the training and receive a Microsoft Azure Pass for evaluation purposes (no credit card required).You will also learn more about receiving significant Microsoft Azure 12-month grants for your research, and join one of over 300 projects worldwide using the Cloud – http://www.windowsazurepass.com/research

Microsoft Azure is a general, open, and flexible global cloud platform supporting any language, tool, or framework – including Linux, Java, Python, and other non-Microsoft technologies.  The program will cover a variety of “hands-on labs” with programming examples predominantly in Python and Java.   No prior experience of Microsoft Azure is required.  The only prerequisite is basic programming experience in some language.

Microsoft Azure Machine Learning is a new offering from Microsoft that makes it easy for the academic community to use machine learning technology for their research. In contrast to traditional tools for machine learning, Azure Machine Learning can be mastered without extensive technical training and it facilitates collaboration with colleagues

The attendee’s laptop does not need to have the Windows operating system installed – Microsoft Azure is accessed via an Internet browser. After attending the course, researchers will feel confident in applying cloud computing in their current and future research.

For questions about the course please contact kenji.takeda@microsoft.com

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Using a tablet for smarter learning (part 1)

Friday, August 22nd, 2014

Since tablets became mainstream in 2010, more and more students have started relying on these nifty gadgets to take their learning experience to the next level.

However, many students still are unaware or unconvinced of the advantages of tablet-based learning. In the following section, we’ll look at why exactly a tablet is a fantastic investment.

Why a tablet?

In short, there are four reasons:

1. The most obvious advantage of a tablet is the level of mobility it offers. As a student, you’ll most probably carry around at least a notepad, your prescribed books and your class notes. And, for many, a calculator, dictionary and diary/calendar are also indispensable. Carrying these items around all day long can quickly become a back-breaking burden – which is why most students simply leave their heavy books at home.

With a tablet, though, you can have all of these resources compacted into the size of an A5 notepad. No more forgetting books or notes at home – everything you need is but a few finger taps away. This is a killer feature in itself.

2. However, the true academic value of a tablet becomes evident when one looks at its potential as an in-class companion. Not only does a tablet keep everything you need at hand, it also allows you to manipulate these resources in useful ways. For example, you can add bookmarks, highlights and notes to your prescribed books and class notes while the lecturer is discussing them. You can also efficiently create rich notes of your own.

You’ll be able to combine typing and drawing on the screen to capture, for example, key points in a class discussion or diagrams and charts drawn by the lecturer. You’ll be able to neatly organise these notes in subject folders for future reference.

The biggest killer feature of a tablet in class, however, is the fact that it allows you to record what is said in class so that you can listen to these recordings while preparing for an exam. While it’s not practical to record every second of every class (because –let’s be honest –you’ll never listen to all of that again), this feature is extremely handy to record important bits of a lecturer’s explanation or a class discussion.

Lastly, a tablet also gives you quick access to handy reference material. Need to quickly look up a word’s definition or do a calculation? A tablet lets you do both at lightning speed, which means that you won’t lose track of the train of thought in class.

3. Tablets don’t only shine inside the classroom. Any student who’s had to scour stacks and stacks of paper notes to review specific content before an exam will testify to how frustrating, tedious and time-wasting this can be.

Having all of your own notes –and the slideshows or hand-outs provided by the lecturer –neatly organised on a single device, where it’s accessible with a few taps of the finger, eliminates the hassles of paper-based exam preparation and gives you more time to actually study.

4. An often-missed advantage of tablet-based learning is the fact that e-book versions of prescribed books and textbooks are usually cheaper than their print counterparts. While many books are not yet available in digital format, the savings on those that are can quickly compound to a substantial amount.

And, of course, using an e-book offers all of the advantages of digital learning, including such timesavers as being able to search for words and phrases, jump to specific pages and chapters, add multi-coloured highlights and make digital annotations.

Next time : Buying a tablet: The choices

[ARTICLE BY JOHANNES JONKER]

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Useful, free web apps you should know about

Friday, August 8th, 2014

As part of the expansion of the web, the last decade has seen the rise of thousands —if not millions —of web apps: often-simple tools that allow users to complete specific tasks via a web page from any computer connected to the internet.

The possibilities are almost endless: think of a task you need to complete and you can be nearly certain that there will be a useful web app that fits the job. The key, however, is to know where to look. And that’s where this guide comes in.

Below, you’ll find a list of a few tried-and-tested web apps that —if used correctly —can make your life much, much easier. Try them. Use them. Share them.

NOTE TAKING AND STUDY AIDS

Evernote: A very popular note management solution, allowing you to pull in notes from your tablet, computer, phone and elsewhere. The web app lets you create, edit, manage and search your notes library. www.evernote.com

Mindmap: An easy-to-use tool that lets you create your own mind maps quickly and efficiently. Great for summarising course notes, articles and books. www.mindmup.com

Gliffy and LucidChart: Both great apps for illustrating a concept with diagrams. Both include many useful shapes and tools. However, both have some limits on the free account. Still, they are great for occasional diagramming. www.gliffy.com and www.lucidchart.com

Google Drive Documents: Google’s web-based word processor. It’s perfect for summaries, essays and more and you and other people can type in the same document at the same time. This makes it perfect for team planning, agendas and taking minutes in a meeting. Google Drive Documents is part of — you guessed it — Google Drive, so you’ll need to create an account there. drive.google.com

Cram: A lightweight flashcard tool that lets you create your own flashcards (having one word/phrase on the front and one on the back) and then review them alphabetically or randomly. Very useful for any content for which you have to remember a key point for a specific concept, e.g. in learning a language. www.cram.com

PRESENTATIONS

Prezi: Tired of slideshows with sparkling text and way too many bullet points? Do your next presentation with Prezi. It’s a great way to illustrate how your ideas fit into one another because all your content is displayed on a single canvas, with the ‘view’ simply panning and zooming from one area to another. www.prezi.com

Google Drive Presentations: If you prefer a more traditional ‘slideshow’, or if Prezi isn’t suitable for communicating your message, you can use Google’s PowerPoint alternative for free. While it’s not as feature-packed as PowerPoint, it’s still a great way to do presentations if you don’t want to dish out money for the aforementioned duo. drive.google.com

 RESEARCH

Google Scholar: This app brings the power of Google search to research. By letting you search thousands of academic databases (including those used by EBSCOHost, JSTOR, etc.) quickly and easily, it cuts down the time necessary to find the articles you need for projects, essays and theses. As a bonus, it also lets you import article metadata into a citation manager (see Zotero below) directly from the search results page. When accessing Google Scholar from outside the Stellenbosch University, use scholar.google.com.ez.sun.ac.za to get access to the journals to which the university subscribes. Otherwise: scholar.google.com

[Special mention] Zotero: While Zotero isn’t strictly speaking a web app (although it also runs in your browser), it’s just too good and relevant not to include here. For a full Zotero guide, check out the previous article  in this series.

ORGANISATION AND COMMUNICATION

Google Calendar: This app is the gold standard in free calendar tools. It helps you keep track of your appointments, events, deadlines and general planning — all while still being very easy to use. It can also keep in sync with all your devices, so that you can have access to your calendar on your tablet, phone and computer. calendar.google.com

Gmail: This e-mail service has ever-expanding storage space and great search functionality. Gmail is different from Microsoft Outlook, Yahoo Mail and other services, in that it uses ‘labels’ instead of traditional folders. You can tag any e-mail with one or more labels and subsequently search by that label. Also, because you have such a large amount of space (15 GB as of early 2014), you never have to delete e-mails and lose them forever. Consequently, because you have access to all e-mails you ever sent or received, Gmail includes powerful searching capabilities (think: Google for your inbox) that allow you to delve into your tons and tons of messages effortlessly. www.gmail.com

Wunderlist: task management made easy — and beautiful. Keep track of your daily to-do list, priorities, shopping list and more. You can also share task lists with friends — a great tool for group projects. www.wunderlist.com

FILE SHARING

Google Drive: Install Google Drive on your computer and then simply drop a file in the assigned folder to upload it. Once uploaded, you can share files with friends. Google Drive has a range of web-based editors that are included by default —two of which were previously mentioned —that make collaboration easy. You can also share specific folders in your Drive with your friends, which works really well to keep all the files for a group project stored in one place. drive.google.com

Dropbox: simple and easy file sharing. While it works in the same way as Google Drive, it doesn’t include the online editors built into the latter. However, Dropbox remains one of the simplest ways to share files between devices and people. Dropbox is particularly useful when you need to send a large file via e-mail and don’t want to clog up the recipient’s mail storage: simply upload the file to your Dropbox and then share the link in an e-mail. www.dropbox.com

[ARTICLE BY JOHANNES JONKER]

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