Canvas WU is WU's new learning management system and has been in use by selected master's programs and individual courses of the bachelor's programs since the winter semester 2022/23. In the following semesters, more courses of the master's and bachelor's programs will gradually switch to Canvas WU.

The dashboard - your personal start page

When you log in to Canvas WU, you will be taken to the Dashboard, your personal home page. Here you will find links to all the courses you are a member of, as well as an overview of to-dos and events from your courses. On each Canvas page you will find the global navigation menu on the left side of the page, which gives you quick access to frequently used Canvas functions:

• Account: Change language, upload profile picture, set notification options.

• Dashboard: overview of all active courses, in
  which you are a member, to-do list and current activities

• Courses: list of all active and archived courses you are a member of

• Groups: Overview of all groups you are a member of

• Calendar: all course dates summarized

• Inbox: possibility to contact teachers and coursse members

• History: History of the last course pages viewed

Your courses in Canvas WU:

As soon as you have clicked on a course, an inner side menu appears next to the outer side menu: the course navigation menu. This menu lists all those applications and links that are enabled in this course. In most cases, the following menu items will be visible:

• Start: This is the home page of your course.

• Announcements: This is where you will find important news, info, or notes about your course.

• Modules: This is the heart of Canvas WU: the place where all content and
  learning materials are organized and structured. You will find slides, exercises, quizzes, lecturecasts and much more.

• Assignments: Here you will find all assignments that need to be worked on or submitted for your course. tThey are usually grade-relevant.

• Discussions: You can post questions and answers or exchange ideas in discussion forums.

• Grades: Get an overview of your scores and performance status here.

The right sidebar displays to-dos and events just like your dashboard page, but only for the course you are currently in. Additional info, such as feedback received, may also be included.

Microsoft Teams is a web conferencing tool that can be used for synchronous online meetings, conferences, and classes. It can also be used for holding oral exams. It includes a range of useful features, for example a chat function.

How to activate Microsoft Teams

Please configure your WU student account for Microsoft Teams.

1. Log in to the Controlpanel application.

2. Click on “My email” and “Office365 configuration.”

3. Please read the Office365 terms of use, then tick the checkbox next to “I have read the terms of use for Office365 and accept them,” and click to submit your confirmation.

4. After that, you have to select the full range of features (email, Skype4Business, Teams, SharePoint, Yammer, OneDrive) and submit your settings again.*

 

 
* When you try to sign in to Teams and you receive the message“You’re missing out!” or a similar message, this means that the activation has not been completed.

Please note: It may take up to 24 hours until the activation is completed. You’ll have to wait for approximately 24 hours until you can sign in to Microsoft Teams with your WU student login data.

1. To sign in, please go to the following page: teams.microsoft.com.

2. As your sign-in address, please enter: hYourStudentIDnumber@s.wu.ac.at (letter h followed by your student ID number; don’t forget the “s” after the @ symbol!). You will then be forwarded to the WU login page.

3. Please log in with hYourStudentIDnumber or hYourStudentIDnumber@s.wu.ac.at (once again, type an “s” after @; don’t use hYourStudentIDnumber@wu.ac.at) and your WU account password.

 

Participating in courses via Microsoft Teams

Prior to the start of a synchronous online class, your course instructors will send you an email with the link to the appropriate web conference (class). Please be sure to configure your WU student account for Microsoft Teams at least 24 hours before the first class if the course is held on Teams. Ideally, you should complete the configuration earlier than that so that you have enough time to familiarize yourself with Teams.

Activating your WU account for Zoom

Please activate your WU Account for Zoom:

1. Go to www.wu.ac.at/zoom

2. Click on „Sign in – Configure your account“. 

3. Login with your Office365 account (h+StudentIDnumber@s.wu.ac.at)

4. Your Zoom account will now be created automatically. Go to "Settings" if you would like to change any of your account settings.

 

If you use Zoom in a browser, please note that this currently only works with Google Chrome, Firefox and Chromium Edge. We strongly recommend that you download the Zoom desktop app. It has more functions than the browser version:https://zoom.us/download

Please follow the instructions on your laptop or PC to download the app.

Joining webconferences via Zoom

If your course in Canvas has activated Zoom, you can join a Zoom session directly in Canvas.

1. Click on the course in Canvas.

2. In the menu on the left, click on "Zoom".

3. You will then see a list of all the planned Zoom webconferences for this course. You can join a webconference live by clicking on "Join".

 

If your lecturers do not directly plan their webconferences via Canvas, they will send you an email with the link to the webconference. Please click on this link at the beginning of the webconference (=class).

There are 250 virtual PC-workstations available at WU. These are equipped with the same specialised software that is available in the PC rooms on campus. Students and lecturers can access the virtual PCs remotely, e.g. from home.

What can the virtual PCs be used for?

• The virtual PCs can be used for courses that are normally held in a PC room, but are held online. For this scenario, 123 virtual PCs are available, assigned to three virtual PC-rooms (S, M, and L). Lecturers can book a virtual PC-room via Rooms. Students and lecturers can then access the virtual PCs during the scheduled course dates. Access authorisation is automatically granted to lecturers and students registered for this course.  

• The remaining 77 virtual PCs are assigned to the virtual lab and are available to WU students at any time for practice. The PCs in the three virtual PC rooms mentioned above are also accessible to all students every day after the last course. The allocation of virtual PCs for practice purposes is based on the first-come-first-served principle.

How can I access the virtual PC workstations?

There are two ways for accessing a virtual PC.

1. Access via Horizon Client:

• Go to: https://labconnect.wu.ac.at.

• Click on "VMware Horizon Client installieren" to download the Horizon Client for your operating system.

• Then open the Horizon Client. When starting the client, you need to add a server by clicking on "Add Server" and entering the following address: https://labconnect.wu.ac.at

• Sign in using your WU e-mail address (hStudentIDNumber@s.wu.ac.at).

• After double-clicking on a PC room, you will be assigned a free virtual PC from the respective pool and logged in automatically.

2. Access via the Horizon website:

• Visit the following website: https://labconnect.wu.ac.at

• Click "VMware Horizon HTML Access". 

• Log in with your WU email address (hStudentIDNumber@s.wu.ac.at). 

• Select the PC room you want to use and you will be redirected to a free virtual PC in the respective pool.

An image-PDF-page usually has a size of 1.5 MB. In order to keep the load on the bandwidth and thus the time for an upload to LEARN as low as possible, the recommended file size of the entire PDF is a maximum of 10 MB.

Therefore, we recommend that you set the photo camera in a way that the resoluation of the resulting picture is reduced. This will also help to minimize the file size when converting to PDF format.

If your upload would take too much time due to file size, your teachers may ask you to submit a file hash and upload the file later. Files can be uniquely identitfied with the help of hash values. A changed hash value of a file is proof that the file was changed subsequently by the student. If your teachers ask you to submit a file hash, they will provide information on how to do this.

You can convert handwritten notes into a PDF format using your smartphone. We recommend the following helpful apps for this:

• With the help of the free app Adobe Scan, notes can be scanned or PDF documents can be created from previously taken pictures. Scans can be edited and annotated. The app is available for iOS and Android.

• With the Microsoft Office Lens PDF Scanner, handwritten notes can be scanned in very good quality, visually edited and merged into a PDF. The app is available for Android and iOS devices.

• iOS: In PDF Expert, files can be imported from the Pictures or Files app as well as from the computer and from the cloud.

• Android: In the Image to PDF Converter, images from selected folders can be converted into a PDF.

NOTE: If you have a exam with automated online exam supervision (proctoring), you must transfer the images to the computer before uploading them in LEARN. A smartphone cannot access the proctored task.

If you do not have a smartphone, the following options are available on a computer / laptop:

Windows 10:

1. Open the picture in the default program or in Paint 3D.

2. Click on "Menu" at the very top left.

3. Select "Print" and "2D Print".

4. Then select "Microsoft Print to PDF" in the printer selection at the top.

5. You will find the PDF in the specified storage location.

 

Mac:

1. In the finder, open the folder with the required images and select them.

2. Right-click on one of the selected files.

3. In the context menu, click on "open with > preview (default)".

4. In the sidebar of the preview app, you can see all the images. You can now change the order by moving the images and thus change the later display order within the PDF.

5. After you have made all the necessary adjustments, click on "file > print" in the menu bar at the top of the screen.

6. Then click on the drop-down menu at the bottom left and select "save as PDF".

 

Browser-based:

1. Open your browser and go to the Online2PDF website.

2. Click on the "select files" button.

3. Now navigate to the photos you want to convert. You can select more than one by holding down Shift while clicking on each file.

4. Click on "open" to upload the files.

5. Select "image to PDF" underneath.

6. Click on "convert" to start the process. The converted files will be downloaded automatically and can be found in your download folder. As files have to be uploaded twice here, this browser-based converesion may take longer.