Just about all of the major browsers have a private browsing function and they all work pretty much the same way - they discard your browsing history, browser cache, and information that you typed into forms once you close the browser. But does it actually protect your privacy? It depends on what kind of privacy you're after. More on this after the break. Allegedly, the value of a private browsing mode is that it would allow for use cases such as a thoughtful people who use a shared... Read More

If you were to ask Facebook how many users they had, they would tell you that as of 21 Sep 2011, there are 750 million active users and 70% of them are outside of the United States. That means 225 million users in the United States - amost 75% of the national population - is using Facebook. It's easy to see, then, why so many folks find it easy to disregard the naysayers and find a sense of safety and comfort in the fact that they are just small fish in a very, very big pond. But is it really as safe and anonymous as the numbers seem to suggest? Spoiler alert: It isn't.

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ITS will be performing scheduled maintenance this Saturday, September 17^th, 2011, from 9:00am to 12:00pm.  During this maintenance period, you may be unable to access ITS services.  If you encounter any problems, please wait until the maintenance period has elapsed and check if you still run into problems before reporting them to the Technology Helpdesk via email at helpdesk@oxy.edu or by voicemail at (323) 259-2880 (x2880 from on campus). We apologize in advance for any inconvenience this maintenance may cause. Have any questions about why we do the things we do and when we do them? Please feel free to send me an email or leave a comment and keep an eye on our blog - we'll have a maintenance FAQ/Q&A posted soon. Boring technical details about what we'll be doing this Saturday below the break. Here's the breakdown of how we'll be spending... Read More

In a nod to "going green",

ITS is offering a new option for Banner users to save reports and programs into a PDF rather than printing them out. Simply specify PDF as the printer in the Printer Control block when you submit a job. The script converts the output into a PDF and puts your files into a new, Windows-accessible directory. If you would then always want the program in question to print into a PDF, the printer default of PDF may be saved on GJAJOBS for that program. However, that setting changes the print option for all users of that particular program, not just for you (although users can override it upon submission). ITS believes this will be a good (and green) service... Read More