Athens, Ga. – The University of Georgia’s email system, UGAMail, will undergo a second upgrade in November. Microsoft is requiring all of its clients using Office 365 Education for email, calendar and task services to upgrade to the latest version.
Microsoft is expected to finalize the upgrade date sometime in October and UGA Enterprise Information Technology Services will announce that finalized upgrade date when it becomes available.
For this next upgrade, the major difference will be a new look for people using UGAMail online through the Outlook Web App. After logging in to UGAMail online, the web interface will show the new Office 365 design, which is cleaner with a simple blue bar at the top of the page and fewer icons, said Michael Lucas, associate CIO for infrastructure and research computing.
Those using an email client or mobile device to access UGAMail will not be affected by the upgrade. However, all mailboxes will be increased from a maximum of 25 GB to 50 GB.
“We’re encouraging UGA students, faculty and staff to take a quick look at the new Web interface of UGAMail so they won’t be surprised at the new Office 365 design after their email accounts are migrated in November,” Lucas said. “We also encourage everyone to ensure their software is compatible with Office 365, as Microsoft will be eliminating technical support of some applications next year.”
During the upgrade, there may be brief periods during the migration that users can’t access UGAMail, but email will continue to be sent to inboxes.
“Our first upgrade of UGAMail in August went very smoothly for more than 105,000 accounts,” Lucas said.
UGA EITS manages UGAMail accounts. EITS has screen shots of the updated Web design and answers to frequently asked questions available at office365.uga.edu. For more information, see eits.uga.edu.
