Email Registration

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The Computing Centre manages its users through a database (IDS). This database can be used by VUB/ULB users to register their email address at a central repository or to make a request for an email alias (see below for a definition).

Warning:
This form cannot be used to make a request for an email-account; do this through the account activation page

If you have no experience with email aliases, you should read the explanations below. Otherwise you can directly start the registration procedure. The following actions are available:

• Register an email address
• Make a request for a mail alias
• Modify an existing registration
• Delete an existing registration

Introduction about email addresses

At the VUB/ULB, 2 kinds of email addresses are most frequently used: email addresses based on a loginname, and email addresses which are email aliases.

Email addresses based on your loginname

These addresses are currently the most wide-spread at the VUB/ULB, and are based on the loginname a user has on a certain machine. Messages sent to these addresses are delivered directly to this user (loginname) on that machine.

• loginname@vub.ac.be (Example: tmulder@vub.ac.be)
• loginname@machine.vub.ac.be (Example: tmulder@mach1.vub.ac.be)
• loginname@ulb.ac.be (Example: jmpatron@ulb.ac.be)
• loginname@machine.ulb.ac.be (Example: jmpatron@mach2.ulb.ac.be)

Email aliases based on your full name

An email alias is an address that is not based on the login name a user has on a system but it contains the full name of the user itself and a maildomain.

• Firstname.Lastname@vub.ac.be (Example: Thomas.Mulder@vub.ac.be)
• Firstname.I.Lastname@vub.ac.be (Example: Thomas.N.Mulder@vub.ac.be)
• Firstname.Lastname@maildomain.vub.ac.be (Example: Thomas.Mulder@rece.vub.ac.be)
• Firstname.I.Lastname@maildomain.vub.ac.be (Example: Thomas.N.Mulder@rece.vub.ac.be)
• Firstname.Lastname@ulb.ac.be (Example: Jean-Marie.Patron@ulb.ac.be)
• Firstname.I.Lastname@ulb.ac.be (Example: Jean-Marie.L.Patron@ulb.ac.be)
• Firstname.Lastname@maildomain.ulb.ac.be (Example: Jean-Marie.Patron@resulb.ulb.ac.be)
• Firstname.I.Lastname@maildomain.ulb.ac.be (Example: Jean-Marie.L.Patron@resulb.ulb.ac.be)

  [ The 'I' in the left hand part of the mail alias refers to the second initial ]

Such email addresses are translated by a central mailhost into a delivery address which is a login on a certain machine (Delivery host).

This system is a one-way system only, meaning that only messages sent to you are processed this way. Messages sent to someone will not appear to have been sent from this address unless you configure your mailreader program (Eudora, elm, pine, mail, ...) to do so. How to do this is explained in this alias configuration guide.

If you are a system administrator on a (UNIX) system, see the sendmail for email aliases configuration guide.

Some departments at the VUB/ULB already manage their own Alias email addresses. In most cases, they use local system aliases on a local machine at the department which translates full name based addresses into delivery addresses on a particular machine.

Requests for an email alias in a maildomain for which the department itself manages the email alias cannot be handled by IDS. You should contact the mail administrator of that department.

Persons having an address in such a maildomain can however register their address in this centralized IDS database ; they can do so by registering their email alias as an email address based on loginname, the system will recognize that it is a valid request, and deal with it as with any other request.

About the procedure

The procedure is completely processed using WWW and email, and runs as follows:

1. A user makes a request for an email address or alias
2. The request is checked against the database. A request is either directly accepted, accepted in a second phase (by human intervention), or rejected.
3. When the request is accepted, a mail message will be sent to the user's delivery address as confirmation. It will contain the specifications as entered by the user.
4. The user has to send this message back to the alias administrator to confirm that he agrees with the specifications, and that he wishes to validate the request in the database.
5. Once the confirmation has been sent to the Email administrator by the user, the address will be activated in the database. The user will be informed by email upon completion of the activation.
6. If an email alias has been requested or changed, the user will receive a separate message indicating that this email alias has become operational.

General directives

As stated before, this form cannot be used to make a request for an emailaccount ; contact the proper person for that purpose. See the IDS Introduction Guide for details.

You can only register one address.

It is not possible to use accentuated characters, as this is not supported by our database. Using accentuated characters in email addresses is also not adviced as some systems may not handle these addresses properly.

In case of problems or questions, you can mail to the User Support Group.