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Chat: Slack at USU

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Slack is here to make your work life simpler, more pleasant, and more productive.  This is an instance provided by USU IT for communication between USU IT and USU employees. This instance is only available for use by employees with an @usu.edu email account and is not available to students or external users. External Slack integrations are not provided in this instance of Slack. This is available for other departments to use within these bounds.

For departments requiring more functionality than offered by this instance of Slack the recommendation is to register for their own instance of Slack at https://slack.com.

Who may be invited?

Any employee with an @usu.edu may be invited to the USU Slack instance to join the numerous discussion channels, create private groups, and for team conversations. A USU employee that currently has a Slack account will have to invite you. 

How can I be invited?

A USU employee that currently has a Slack account will have to invite you using the following steps.

  1. Login to Slack using the Slack desktop application or at usu.slack.com
  2. Select the drop down next to USU at the top left
  3. Select "Invite people to USU"



  4. Enter the @usu.edu email address for the user and Invite as a member.  This needs to be their USU Preferred email, either Anumber@usu.edu or, if they have a first.last@usu.edu, that address.



  5. It may take 24 hours for the Slack account to be approved and enabled
  6. When the account has been approved and created the user will receive an Invitation Email. Use the "Join Now" button to login to Slack


  7. To login enter the USU email address where the email was received and enter a unique password to be used for logging in to https://usu.slack.com

How Slack Works

You'll spend most of your time in Slack in channels. When you launch Slack for the first time, you will enter the #general channel, which is sort of like the front room of your team's workspace. Your team may have many different channels for your different projects or departments. You can add your thoughts to the conversation in the text box at the bottom of the screen.

Some recommended channels to monitor are #usu_it, #usu_networking and #security_talk, you can find these via the Search bar at the top. These will keep you up to date on what is happening in IT at USU.

Anything you type into any of these channels can be seen by anyone else on USU's instance of Slack. If you want to have a one-on-one conversation within Slack, send a direct message to that person. Want to speak in a more private setting with a group of people? Then you want a Private Group. Here, only the people invited to the channel can see the conversation and history. Anybody in the channel can still invite others, though, so keep this in mind while chatting.

Slack Desktop Apps

There are desktop Slack apps available for Windows, macOS and Linux.  To install go https://slack.com/downloads to get the installer for your OS.

Slack Mobile Apps

Along with desktop Slack apps, there are mobile apps for iOS and Android.  They are available by searching for "Slack" in your mobile device's app store or you can go to https://slack.com/downloads for links to the app store.  

 


For further assistance, please contact your Department IT Support or the IT Service Desk