Passwords at the Computing Centre

Table of contents

1. Password rules
2. How to change your password
3. Useful hints for verifying your password if you have problems
4. What if I have forgotten/lost my password

1. Password rules

The Computing Centre is enforcing a number of rules for the password of computer accounts at the Computing Centre.

Following rules will be enforced by the password changing program :

• At least 6 characters and maximum 8 [ as of 13 July 2011 at least seven characters are required! ]
• At least one uppercase (capital) letter A-Z
• At least one lowercase (small) letter a-z
• At least one digit 0-9
• At least one special character out of the set `!$%^&*()_+-=;,./<>?
• No birth date, first name, family name
• No word to be found in dictionaries
• No loginname or any reverse or circular shift of that loginname

Additional measures of safety are changing your computer systems password(s) periodically and NOT writing it down somewhere for easy reference. Choose passwords which are relatively easy to remember yet difficult to guess.

2. How to change your password

2.1. Change the password on the computers at the Computing Centre

Please use the Personal Account Manager to change your password:

http://www.vub.ac.be/tools/passwd.html

Important: you can NOT change the password from within Eudora (Special/Change password). You have to use the password change procedure above.

Note: the UNIX passwd command is not longer operational on the computers at the Computing Centre.
Note: the password of the mailserver (mach/pop/imap/Webmail) is the same as the password of your "netid".

2.2 Change your password on fileservers vubs1 (VUB public computerrooms in buildings B and K, aka Z-drive) and NESTOR

You cannot change the password on the fileservers vubs1 and NESTOR. The passwords on those servers are synchronized with the password of the "netid".

3. Useful hints for verifying the password if you have problems

1. Make sure that the password concurs with the rules we impose
2. Try typing your password in a field where you can see the characters you enter to make sure that what you type corresponds with what you intend (and make sure noone is looking over your shoulder while doing this). Also try typing the password using the normal keyboard and not the numeric keyboard.
3. Make sure the CAPS lock is off (or on if you have changed your password with the CAPS lock on)
4. Make sure that you have used the correct username/loginname/netid (not to confuse with your email address or the name-part of your mailalias Firstname.Lastname !) while logging on and that it is in lowercase (small) letters (!). A username/loginname is max. 8 characters long and contains only small letters and occasionally  numbers (example: dpeeters ; not Daniel.Peeters nor Daniel.Peeters@vub.ac.be or dpeeters@vub.ac.be or DPeeters@vub.ac.be).
5. Also see http://www.vub.ac.be/tools/qna/accessdenied.html for other reasons why you may not get access.

¹ This procedure will also resend the password to the VUB NT domain (public computerrooms in building B and K).

4. What if I have forgotten/lost my password

You can reset your password through the Personal Account Manager. If you also have forgotten your secret question and answer and are thus unable to reset your password, you must visit the Computing Centre in person and come to the 2nd floor with a valid ID (personnel or student card) to get a new password.

The Computing Centre is building O on the ULB Campus Solbosch, Av. A. Buyl 91, 1050 Brussels. The usual opening hours are from 7:00 till 21:00 on weekdays. Extra closing dates for this week can be found below.

Operations schedule for 13 February to 20 February 2012

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Monday
13 February	14 February	15 February	16 February	17 February	18 February	19 February	20 February
8:30-16:30	8:30-16:30	8:30-16:30	8:30-16:30	8:30-16:30	CLOSED	CLOSED	8:30-16:30

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