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The College of New Rochelle
 

 
Fall 2001
RECOMMENDED SOFTWARE AND DESKTOP ARRANGEMENT
FOR PUBLIC ACCESS COMPUTERS
 
The following software applications are recommended by Academic Computing Services as a standardized set that should be on all computers accessible to students at The College of New Rochelle. It is anticipated that individual areas and classrooms will require subsets of additional software to serve the individual needs of students in the four Schools.
  
PCs should include the following software:
  • Windows XP with default bundled software -- ServicePack 2
  • McAfee VirusScan Enterprise
  • Deep Freeze Security program
  • Microsoft Office Suite 2003 (including Word, PowerPoint, Excel) or higher*
  • Internet Explorer 6.0 (with Service Pack 2) or Firefox 1.6
  • Apple Quicktime 6.0 or higher
  • Adobe Acrobat Reader 7.0
*Microsoft Office2003 upgrade is in progress
  
Computers available to students should have a simple and well-organized Windows desktop (the basic area on your screen before opening any programs). Sample images of the basic desktops, including desktop with additional programs are on the following pages.
 
Here are a few examples of additional applications that might be installed on a computer due to the specific needs of a class or area:
SigiPlus Transparent Language
Policy Management WinZip
MatLab SPSS
 
 
Important Note: These programs (and most others) require a site license covering the total number of copies to be installed. If you are responsible for public access computers or a computer classroom, you must keep copies of the software licenses on file.
 
 
Arrangement of the Windows desktop
 
The blank area on your screen after Windows completes the boot up process is called the Windows desktop (or simply, the desktop). The desktop will have a set of icons that you click on to access programs on the hard drive. It is important that the icons reflect the software that is regularly used in the computer. A clean and uncluttered desktop benefits both students and faculty through ease of use.
 
 
An example of the standard desktop icon arrangement
 
The "My Computer" and "Recycle Bin" icons must be on the desktop as part of the Windows operating system. With the standard set of softwre programs, there should be two additional icons, one for Microsoft Word and one for Internet Explorer. The standard desktop should look like the following:
 
 
The other programs included with a minimum installation (such as Deep Freeze Security and McAfee Virus Scan Protection) should not have icons on the desktop since students and faculty do not need access to them.
 
By default, Windows also has a "Network Neighborhood" icon on the desktop. Depending on which version of Deep Freeze you are using, it may be possible to set Deep Freeze so this icon is hidden as an additional security feature.
 
As a general rule, chat programs and instant messenger type software should be kept off the computers as they run in the background even when they are not used and drain memory resources from the operating system.
 
 
An example of the standard desktop icon arrangement
with additional programs installed
 
Here is an example of a desktop in a classroom where additional software has been installed to serve the specific needs of students and faculty. Since this classroom is used for language instruction and a science course, the desktop has additional icons for Transparent Language, Vocabulary Master, and BioLab Fly.
 
 
In this instance, students are frequently accessing these additional programs and it is easier to have icons for them directly on the desktop.
 
 
An example of the standard desktop icon arrangement
with additional programs installed
 
Windows also installs a number of additional icons by default, including "Connect to the Internet," "MSN Network," and "My Briefcase." Since public access computers connect ot the Internet through the CNR network, and since students should not be saving files to the hard drive, all of these icons should be removed from the desktop.
 
Keep in mind that if a program does not have a desktop icon, it is still easy to access through START / PROGRAMS / menu. Thus, only programs that are used on a regular basis should have icons placed on the desktop.