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Those affected: users of Simmons-owned or personally-owned computers running any version of Microsoft Office or Windows. This message does not affect users of Macintosh computers.

For advice about your personally-owned Windows computer, please see the end of this message.

Technology will deliver a Windows Operating System and Microsoft Office update to Simmons-owned Windows computers, with the exception of Lab and Classroom computers, on Thursday, January 10. After 5am, you may see a dialog box advising you to reboot your computer so that the updates can take effect. If your Simmons-owned computer is not on at the time of the update, you will receive it and be asked to reboot the next time the computer is turned on. It may be that your computer receives the updates in advance. In this case, when shutting down your computer, you may be asked to “Install updates and shut down.” Doing this will install the updates and spare you having to reboot your computer on the scheduled install date.

If you use a Simmons-owned laptop, your computer will not receive this update until it is connected to the network at Simmons. Technology recommends that you connect your Simmons-owned laptop directly to the Simmons network as soon after the updates are released as possible. If you do not make regular visits to campus, please contact the Help Desk to determine how best to keep your laptop safe from issues these updates address.

If your Simmons computer is up-to-date you will not be affected.

If you do see a dialog box, clicking the button will reboot your computer. You do not need to respond to the dialog box immediately. The dialog box will stay on top of your other windows as a reminder. So, if you are working on something, slide the dialog box out of the way until it is convenient to reboot, save all of your documents, and click the dialog box button to reboot.

Lab and Classroom Windows computers will be updated and automatically rebooted on a later date.

If you have any questions, please contact the Help Desk at 617-521-2222 or by email at helpdesk@simmons.edu

If you are using Windows on your home computer, we urge you to run Microsoft Update on your PC to download and install the most recent patches, or use Internet Explorer to go to http://update.microsoft.com/ and follow the directions there.