Welcome

[Jon Kavanaugh]

Welcome to Google Apps at IIT Discussion. This a place for the IIT
community to discuss issues and solutions with Google Apps for
Education at IIT and IIT Gmail. Ask questions, post your own user
experience tips, and get support.

[Thomas Reynolds]

Hi Jon,
Thanks for setting this forum up. I have major, major reservations
with this new transition.

First, why do Kent students have 5+ email addresses? This is just
inefficient, confusing, and possibly wasteful (even though it is
electronic). I personally prefer my old @kentlaw.edu address over all
the others.

Second, it is so cumbersome to access the school accounts only through
myIIT.

Third, I used to have everything organized because I filtered my
school email addresses to a private Gmail account. Now, that has been
disrupted, and I'm not sure if I can forward Google Apps accounts to
another Gmail address. I cannot even link all my Google accounts
together for me to sign into one account and have access to all the
others.

Fourth, I cannot receive my emails on my smartphone anymore. Ideally,
I could forward all my accounts to my private Gmail account, which
would then forward them to my phone. Even if there is some way to send
the school account emails to my smartphone, I want them all in one
account.

Fifth, I am worried about exactly what kind of information Google,
IIT, & Kent are obtaining of us. It is well known that Google collects
much private, personal data, preferences, etc. - most of which is
irrelevant to my schools.

Thank you, if there are solutions to these issues I'd like to hear
them!

Sincerely,
Tom

[Andre Schmidt]

Thomas,

I'm a member of the Google Apps implementation team and can help with some of your questions.

On Mon, Jun 25, 2012 at 12:23 PM, Thomas Reynolds <trey...@hawk.iit.edu> wrote:

Hi Jon,
Thanks for setting this forum up. I have major, major reservations
with this new transition.

First, why do Kent students have 5+ email addresses? This is just
inefficient, confusing, and possibly wasteful (even though it is
electronic). I personally prefer my old @kentlaw.edu address over all
the others.

Due to shifting policies over the years, Kent students, faculty, and staff have been given both @kentlaw.edu and @iit.edu accounts.  Going forward the Kent community will only receive @kentlaw.iit.edu email accounts.  The Kent support team is working to remove @iit.edu and @hawk.iit.edu accounts for users who no longer want them, and a communication should be coming from them soon.

You can always forward your Google Apps email account(s) to another account where you want everything to end up.  To forward  your email, click the gear symbol at top right, select Settings, and then "Forwarding and Pop/IMAP".  Google's instructions for setting up forwarding are here: http://support.google.com/mail/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=10957

 

Second, it is so cumbersome to access the school accounts only through
myIIT.

Logging into Google Apps via myIIT does add an extra step, but allows you to log in without having to remember a separate password for Google Apps.  There's many other systems available via myIIT, with access to several of Kent's systems like the Library and helpdesk coming soon.

Third, I used to have everything organized because I filtered my
school email addresses to a private Gmail account. Now, that has been
disrupted, and I'm not sure if I can forward Google Apps accounts to
another Gmail address. I cannot even link all my Google accounts
together for me to sign into one account and have access to all the
others.

In addition to forwarding using the steps above, you can also set up multiple sign-in so you can log into multiple Apps accounts at once, see http://support.google.com/accounts/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1721977.  That way you can log into your  personal Gmail account in one tab and have your Kent Google Apps account open in a second tab.

Fourth, I cannot receive my emails on my smartphone anymore. Ideally,
I could forward all my accounts to my private Gmail account, which
would then forward them to my phone. Even if there is some way to send
the school account emails to my smartphone, I want them all in one
account.

You can set up your phone or other mobile deviceto access your Google Apps accounts.   

iOS: http://www.iit.edu/ots/pdfs/setting_up_google_sync_with_your_ios_device.pdf

Android http://www.iit.edu/ots/pdfs/android_google_setup.pdf

If you need help setting up a mobile device, your college's support team can assist you. For Kent you can mail pch...@kentlaw.iit.edu, and for Main Campus and Stuart contact suppo...@iit.edu.

Fifth, I am worried about exactly what kind of information Google,
IIT, & Kent are obtaining of us. It is well known that Google collects
much private, personal data, preferences, etc. - most of which is
irrelevant to my schools.

You're not alone in this worry, there have been a lot of questions about what Google does with our data now that it's in their hands.  Google sums up their privacy policy as

• It's your content, not ours. Your Apps content belongs to your school, or individual users at your school. Not Google.
• We don't look at your content. Google employees will only access content that you store on Apps when an administrator from your domain grants Google employees explicit permission to do so for troubleshooting.
• We don't share your content. Google does not share personal information with advertisers or other 3rd parties without your consent.
• We sometimes scan content. And for very good reasons, like spam filtering, anti-virus protection, or malware detection. Our systems scan content to make Apps work better for users, enabling unique functionality like powerful search in Gmail and Google Docs. This is completely automated and involves no humans.

A more general security overview for Google Apps for Education, which covers all IIT and IIT Chicago-Kent Google Apps accounts is here:  http://support.google.com/a/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=60762&topic=29190&ctx=topic

I hope this answered some of your questions.  

Andre

-- 

Andre Schmidt

asch...@iit.edu