If you don't see the icon on the screen, try drawing on the SMART podium with the pen. If it still won’t appear, try searching SMART Ink in the Windows Search bar.  

If you are not using the SMART INK feature, it may be easiest to close the program. To do so, just click and drag the icon off the screen. You are also able to click and drag the icon anywhere on the screen. This can come in handy if it’s in the way of something you are trying to draw.

Clicking on the icon opens the menu. In the menu, you can change the drawing tool, color, and line style. The tools are: Pen, Highlighter, Calligraphic Pen, Crayon, Creative Pen, Text Pen, and Paint Brush. There are 4 default colors, but clicking the color icon next to them will allow you to define your own color. Line styles can change from a solid line to a dashed line. You can also change the width and opacity of the markings.

Navigating around the wheel, there is also a toolbox and a star icon. The star icon is where you can define and access your favorite functions. This allows you to find and select tools you use frequently and quickly. The toolbox icon has several different features. They include the ability to zoom in and create a spotlight on the screen.

The functionality of the pen tool can be a bit tricky to get used to. Outside of its own software, it only integrates well with Microsoft Office products. For everything else, the pen will place markings over the screen that will not scroll with the page. However, navigating to a new link will cause any annotations made on that website to disappear.

Inside Microsoft applications, the markings become a part of that file or document. By default, this only works in editing mode. For example, to be able to draw on a PowerPoint that is in Presentation mode, you will need to enable the SMART Ink plug-in for PowerPoint. To do so, just click the settings gear, and navigate to the Plug-ins tab.

There are two main methods to completely erase the annotations you’ve made: One method is to click directly on any marking you’ve made. In the top right-hand corner, select the drop-down icon, click the Select All option, then select the Delete option. Alternatively, as soon as you draw any marking on the screen, a small icon that looks similar to the menu icon appears on the edge of the screen. Click on that icon, then select the Clear button.

If you have further questions, contact the NDSU IT department, or search for a solution at https://support.smarttech.com/en