DICE News 2002-04 #1

We need to make sure that certain information about DICE is brought to
your attention.  Although much of this is available under the FAQ it
is important that major changes are identified sooner rather than
later so this information is being sent direct to you.

The items below are categorised for convenience.  Please make sure you
read the items in the 'General' category and then in other categories
as seems appropriate.  For safety, that means reading everything :-)

There will several postings over coming weeks, in order to keep each
one reasonably short and manageable.

(A copy of this posting will be available on the DICE website under
http://www.dice.informatics.ed.ac.uk/deploy/#deploy_news)

-- 
Jeremy Olsen -+- J.Olsen@ed.ac.uk -+- Tel/Fax:+44 (0)131-650 4443/4587
The University of Edinburgh      -+-      2 Buccleuch Place, Edinburgh
Division of Informatics (ICCS/HCRC)    -+-       EH8 9LW, Scotland, UK
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General
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1) Associate accounts (mainly staff-related)

   There are many users both within and outwith the University who
   have accounts at the existing Informatics sites.  Many of these
   accounts will be extinct and will be purged when new accounts are
   created under the new domain.  However many are either active or
   dormant and will need to be transferred.

   In order to make sure these accounts are transferred correctly and
   maintained correctly in the future it will be important to identify
   a local sponsor who can be contacted for information about the need
   for or usage of these accounts.  This information will be collated
   in the Informatics database for easy tracking.

   There will be a process over the next few weeks where all existing
   associate accounts are checked.  Staff will be notified if they are
   thought to have connections to verify who is the correct sponsor.

   In the future new accounts required for an associate will also
   require a named local sponsor in case subsequent information is
   required.

2) Students and SMS mail service (all ug/pg students in year 2 or above)

   All *new* students, postgraduate as well as undergraduate, within
   Informatics are no longer allowed mailboxes at cogsci, dai or dcs.
   This has been the case for any accounts created since June 2001.
   Accounts are created using the University standard username of
   's<matric>' (eg s3456789) and any email is automatically forwarded
   to the student mail server (SMS), sms.ed.ac.uk.

   Under DICE *all* remaining students (PG and UG) will be moved to
   accounts using the 's<matric>' form of username.  Your old username
   will not be used, even if it was unique. Your old email address
   will continue to work but will be forwarded.

   This changeover will be coordinated to happen at a particular time
   and the date will be announced well in advance.  You should make
   sure that you can access your SMS account (eg if you have forgotten
   your password).  Your account will already exist if you are a
   matriculated student.

   If you want to start using your SMS account now feel free to do so.
   Please refer to the Informatics page about SMS at
   http://www.informatics.ed.ac.uk/systems/email/smsinf.html.  The
   only other thing you will need to do at the moment is forward your
   old email address to your SMS account yourself (email to accounts
   of the form s<matric> are forwarded automatically).  Contact your
   local support team if you need advice on doing this.

   Remember that you also automatically get a friendly form of email
   alias, A.B.Student@sms, and if you have already registered an @ed
   alias (now reserved for staff) that will continue to work as well.


UNIX 
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1) Common Home Directories (everyone)

   Each user will get a single home directory and it will be available
   at all sites.  This will be their existing one (not a new one) or,
   if they have more than one, a nominated one of those (*).  This
   change is being planned at the moment and will be implemented as
   soon as possible.

   NB: this means that your home directory will be much more widely
   visible than it ever was.  It will be viewable at all sites and
   typically by all users (unless you have changed the default
   permissions)

   Please check that this does not have implications for the privacy
   of your files.  If you need assistance in checking that files are
   not inadvertently visible you should contact your local support for
   advice.

   (*) In fact all your existing ones will be available at all sites
   under the /legacy directory.

 : Deploy 

Please contact us with any comments or corrections. Unless explicitly stated otherwise, all material is copyright The University of Edinburgh