Recommended Plugins:

Plug-ins are tiny software programs that add functionality to your web browser. While your browser lets you view the images and text on most web pages, plug-ins add the capability to hear music or other sounds, watch full-motion video, or enjoy multimedia presentations.

	Apple Quick Time Player "The free QuickTime Player is an application for playing, interacting with, or viewing any video, audio, VR, or graphics file that is compatible with QuickTime. This includes MPEG-4 , the new standard for digital media, new in QuickTime 6." (Apple Web site)
	Shockwave, Flash & Authorware Macromedia's Shockwave, Flash and Authorware Player plug-ins let you experience automation and entertainment in your Web browser. The new Shockwave 7 provides auto-updating of the player.
	Adobe Acrobat Reader View and print millions of documents on the Web with the free Adobe® Acrobat® Reader.
	Real Networks RealPlayer Play online audio and video content.
	Microsoft Media Player Windows Media Player supports Windows Media (WMA,ASF), MP3, WAV, MIDI, AVI, and other formats.
	PC Users Mac Users www.Java.com (Note: Select the JRE version for your operating system) Macintosh Runtime for Java The Java 2 Plug-in is necessary for online collaboration tools including Virtual Classroom & Lightweight chat.

Messaging Software (chat)

Chat instantly and privately with classmates,friends, family and co-workers. Unlike email, instant messages appear as soon as they're sent.

	AOL Instant Messenger
	Yahoo Instant Messenger
	MSN Messenger

Office Update File Converters and Viewers:

With the help of converters and viewers from Microsoft® Office Update, you can share your Microsoft Office files with people who have different versions of Office applications, or even with people who don't have Office at all.

Converters: Allow you to open files created by people using different versions of your Office programs.
Viewers: allow people who don't have Office programs to see your work. http://office.microsoft.com/assistance/9798/viewerscvt.aspx