Account Setup
Author: Date: Oct 20, 2020 TOC: yes
1 Do you have an active CS Network account?
Important: The CS Dept maintains its own network of Windows PCs and Unix machines. These are separate from the general University PCs maintained by the ITS (the general university computing services).
In this course, you need a CS network account, which is entirely separate from the general University account you get from ITS.
If you had a CS account in the past (if you took other CS courses, you probably did), it should be reactivated. Follow the steps [Confirming Your Account][] to be sure.
2 If You Have Never Had A CS Account
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Browse to http://www.cs.odu.edu and click on “Account Creation”.
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After following the account creation procedure, use the browser to view your ODU email and wait for the authentication message.
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After authenticating, you will probably need to finish the steps below on another day.
3 Confirming Your Account
If/when You Have A CS account…
3.1 The CS Windows Network
- Log in on one of the Windows PCs.
If you are on-campus, the CS Dept has labs in Dragas and E&CS.
If you are off-campus, you can do this via the Virtual PC Lab. Open a browser and go to the CS Dept home page. Look for the link to the “Virtual Computing Lab”. Follow the instructions given there under “Connecting” to open a Remote Desktop Connection to a virtual lab machine.
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If you have a CS account login, but have forgotten your password, go to the CS Dept home page and click on “Password Reset”.
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If your account is not working for some other reason, contact the system staff.
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3.2 The CS Unix Network
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Using an ssh client, log in to one of our Linux servers.
If you are able to log in, give the command “pwd”. It should respond “/home/yourLoginName”
- If you see anything else (most likely, just “/”), then there was a problem with your account setup. Contact the system staff.
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If all looks OK, then give the command “exit” to log out.
4 If You Have Problems
4.1 Account Problems: Contacting the CS Systems Staff
Important: the CS Dept.’s computing facilities are separate from the general University facilities run by the ITS. ITS staff at the Technical Support Center in Webb Center cannot, in most cases, help you with account problems on the CS Dept. network.
To contact the CS Dept systems staff, send email to root@cs.odu.edu
. As with any emailed communication, you will get the most satisfactory results if you describe your problem clearly and fully.
4.2 Problems with Website Registration
If you encounter problems when trying to register with either the CS350 website, it’s probably not something the CS systems staff can help with, because if you have done the prior steps, we already know you have a working account.
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Be aware that my own lists of students enrolled in the course and of newly-issued login names for students who have created accounts is updated overnight.
If you have enrolled in the course within a day or two, it takes up to a day for ODU to provide that info to us, and then up to a day for my website to pick it up.
If you have just created a CS network account, my website will not know it until the next morning.
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Contact the course instructor (
tkennedy@cs.odu.edu
) if that does not resolve the problem.