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The Department of Computer Science is licensed under the Microsoft DreamSpark program (also known MSDN Academic Alliance), which enables all current faculty, staff, and students to access software available under the program. This allows the department to provide legal copies of certain Microsoft software for academic and non-commercial use.
For more details and to access software, see The Department DreamSpark Site.
Undergraduate students registered in a Computer Science class in the current term are eligible to access the DreamSpark software library. Please note that access in the current term is given to undergrad students the day after the last day students can make registration changes without penalty. Due to changes in the DreamSpark system students will not be notified when access has been enabled.
Computer Science faculty, graduate students, and staff will continue to have access to the DreamSpark library while part of the department unless notified.
Faculty, staff, and students use their NSID and associated password to log onto the DreamSpark website. Please note that although the DreamSpark website is hosted on non U of S servers that authentication (where nsid and passwords are entered) is done on a U of S server.
Do NOT use the DreamSpark website Change Password feature as this will not work and you will be giving your NSID password to a non U of S entity. Only use U o f S services (i.e. PAWS or SSAM) to change your NSID password.
As per U of S policy all email from DreamSpark website servers will be sent to your NSID account hosted on mail.usask.ca (abc123@mail.usask.ca). If you prefer a reading your email from a different account you will have to set up your @mail.usask.ca account to be forwarded to that account.
The MS DreamSpark Preamium subscription allows the Department to supply several Microsoft products to students for academic use. Examples are:
The list of software available changes over time. For a detailed list of the software currently available, please see The Department DreamSpark Site.
A little insight into the process:
Software titles are first released to DreamSpark subscribers, of which the Department of Computer Science is one. We will make these releases available t o staff and faculty in certain circumstances and use it ourselves to install it into the undergraduate labs. But we prefer that faculty, staff, and students acce ss the software through the E-Academy site as E-Academy handles the issuing of keys, tracking downloads, reporting to Microsoft, etc. (much less work and headache s for us).
E-Academy is classed as a "reseller" of Microsoft products so they do not receive the new titles until Microsoft releases it to all resellers. This c an be anywhere from a few days to several weeks after the DreamSpark release date. Once E-Academy receives the release they are able to configure the software as bei ng available for their clients, of which the Department of Computer Science is one. The time from receiving to making available varies from a few days to a week or so in practice.
All provided software packages are available one or more of the following delivery options:
The downloads are compressed and encrypted. A small Windows based application is used to download and unwrap the ISO image file. This means that the downloading must be done from a Windows OS based computer.
CD/DVD burners and burning software are available to Computer Science students in the Computer Science undergraduate laboratories (Spinks addition third floor ).
If downloading at home on a Windows machine and you do not have software that can create a CD from an ISO image file check out ISO Recorder .
You can only access the DreamSpark site and software while you are part of the Department of Computer Science; as in currently taking a class offered by the department or on payroll in the department.
This means that as an undergraduate student you will not have access to the DreamSpark site in between terms (ex: during summer) or during a term that you are not taking a class offered by the Department of Computer Science.
Below are links to the End User Licensing Agreement and Acceptable Usage Policies. You should read these before you go to request and software.
If you have further questions please contact CS Library Help at library at cs.usask.ca or drop by Thorv S306 during office hours.
