Audio recordings of certain course lectures is available online as MP3
Audio and document camera video and/or computer output from certain School of Pharmacy courses is available online as Flash Video^*, Windows Media, and MP4 video for iPod.
*Beginning fall semester, 2008, Real Media has been replaced with Flash Video. Some older videos may only be available as Real Media

Whether your class is online, and whether it is online as video, or audio only depends on in which classroom your class meets.  If your class is taking place in RHPH 172, it is probably being recorded.  If your professor uses his or her own laptop, or uses the document camera, video of the course is probably online.  If your professor is using the room PC, your class is probably online as audio only.

If your class takes place in RHPH 172, FRNY G-140, LILY 1-105, or RHPH 164, your course can be placed online as video.
If you want only audio from your class recorded, there are about 55 classrooms on campus that support audio recording.  For a complete list check here .  Please note that the audio only recording is supported by ITaP, so to request a course be recorded, you'll need to fill out a boilercast recording request form.

If you would like online video, send a request to Mark Sharp.  If you want audio only, send your request to ITaP by using the boilercast recording request form.

To view the Real Media files, you'll need to download and install the free version of Real Player® from http://www.real.com.  If you use Windows® and would like to view the files with Windows Media Player® , you can download and try Real Alternative which will act as a Real Media® codec within Windows Media Player Classic®.   For Windows Media, you just need Windows Media Player version 9 or higher.

Podcasting is a method of publishing files to the Internet that allows users to subscribe to a feed and receive new files automatically. It can be used for text, audio, or video files.  You can subscribe to a podcast feed with a program such as iTunes or Thunderbird and any updates to the podcast will be automatically downloaded to your computer.

Whether you use podcasting or streaming is going to depend on you. If you're on the go all the time and can't always rely on having an internet connection and computer available, using podcasting and downloading the files to your media player will probably be the best option for you. If you normally study near your computer, streaming media will probably work fine for you.

There is a lot of free software available that you can use for subscribing to and downloading podcasts.  The software that will probably work best for most is iTunes since it has the ability to also view and listen to the podcasts.  You can also use Mozilla Thunderbird, but you will need to view or listen to the files with an external program such as Quicktime Player or Windows Media Player.

To subscribe to a podcast with iTunes:
From the Advanced dropdown menu, select subscribe to podcast, then enter the URL and click OK.

To subscribe to a podcast with Thunderbird:
From the Tools dropdown menu, select account settings.
Click 'Add Account', select 'RSS Feed', then click Next.
Give the podcasts folder a name and click finish. (only do this once)
In the folders tree, right click the newly created rss feed folder and select 'Manage subscriptions'
Click the 'Add' button then enter the feed URL and click ok.  Do this for each feed you would like to subscribe to.

Starting in the fall of 2006, the way lectures are recorded and placed online will be handled a little differently.  In the past, when only Real Media was being placed online, audio or video would be available about 10 minutes after class.  With the addition of podcasting, the files will need to be converted to various formats, so there will be a 2 to 6 hour delay before the files appear online.  Files recorded early in the day will be online closer to 2 hours after class, files recorded later in the day will take up to 6 hours.

The video recording system is automated, so there's a possibility that the file was recorded, but due to a network problem, it was never placed online.  There is also a possibility that the encoder malfunctioned and the lecture was not recorded.  If you're waiting for a video file that has never been placed online, contact Mark Sharp.

If you're waiting for an MP3 to be placed online, and it hasn't shown up within 2 or so hours, there may have been a problem at the Boilercast recording facility.  Contact Mike Hicks to see if your file will be made available online.

If you're using the document camera, the most important thing you can do to make your courses more ligible is to adjust the zoom on the lens of the document camera.  When you first turn on the document camera, the lens resets to the full wide position.  Press the telephoto button until your work area fills the screen.

Document camera zoomed out

Document camera zoomed in

Write with fine tipped marker instead of a ball point pen.

If you're using PowerPoint®, you can make it more legible to students by using larger fonts.  Avoid serif fonts.  A font such as Arial is easier to read in video.

If your plan is to just download and listen to the mp3 files, almost any mp3 player should work.  Note that the Sony uses a proprietary naming conventions and containers for some of their devices.  If you have a PSP are able to get the mp3s to work on a it, let me know. If you also want to be able to download video to your player, you'll need one of the video capable iPods.  The videos will not work on the PSP.  The videos may work on a Creative Zen.  If anyone has a Zen and has been able to get the videos to play, let me know and I will update this page.

There is a free program called iTunes agent available for Windows. You can download it here.