Harvard-MIT Data Center

The Concourse Computer Lab is located in room K024, CGIS Knafel Building (1737 Cambridge Street). To get to K024, take the stairs or elevator down one level and go to the left through the open door.

The Concourse Computer Lab has twenty-five Windows and six Mac OSX machines available for users. There are two high-speed, black-and-white laser printers and one color laser printer located in the lab. A color scanner also is located in the lab. Our Lab Help Desk is located here as well.

The Concourse Computer Lab is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The IQSS Computer Lab is located in room K301, CGIS Knafel Building (1737 Cambridge Street). To get to K301, take the elevator to the third floor and go to the corner room nearest the circular staircase.

The IQSS Computer Lab has nine Windows and two Mac OSX machines available for users. There are high-speed, black-and-white laser printers and a color laser printer located in the lab. A color scanner also is located in the lab.

The IQSS Computer Lab is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The CGIS Visitor Kiosks are located in the vestibule outside room K031, CGIS Knafel Building (1737 Cambridge Street). To get to the kiosks, take the stairs or elevator down one level and go to the left through the open door.

The CGIS Visitor Kiosks provide three iMac computers, running Mac OSX. The kiosks are configured specially to not require an account for login. However, application access is limited to Mozilla Firefox only. Printing is not available from these machines.

The CGIS Visitor Kiosks are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The Government Computer Lab is located in room K003, CGIS Knafel Building (1737 Cambridge Street). K003 is only accessible by Government Graduate students.

The Government Computer Lab has two Windows machines, and an iMac computer configured for non-Harvard or MIT ID use. There is a high-speed, black-and-white laser printer located in the lab.

Use of the Government Computer Lab requires card access.

Our public labs are located in CGIS Knafel building at 1737 Cambridge Street in Cambridge Massachusetts. The Concourse Computer Lab, IQSS Computer Lab, and CGIS Visitor Kiosks are always open. The Government Computer Lab is accessible only by Government graduate students. The Computer Training Lab is open only during prescheduled events.

Our public labs are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. CGIS Knafel building access is required to enter any of our public labs.

CGIS Knafel building front doors are open during the academic year:

• Monday through Thursday, 7 AM to 9 PM
• Friday, 7 AM to 7 PM
• Saturday and Sunday, Noon to 5 PM

During school holidays (including spring break) and summer months, CGIS Knafel building front doors are open as follows:

• Monday through Friday, 7 AM to 7 PM
• Saturday and Sunday, Closed

We cannot grant access to the CGIS Knafel building.

For any access questions about our labs, please contact us.

Our public labs require a current CGIS account for logging in. Any person with a valid Harvard or MIT ID can ask for an account. People without valid IDs can apply for accounts with sponsorship.

A CGIS account allows you to store personal files on our network storage infrastructure and access the files anywhere in the world through a web browser. You also can print in the labs for a fee. To find out more about these accounts, eligibility requirements, and application requests, see our Accounts pages.

Our public labs have several visitor kiosk machines that do not require an account. For more information, please see CGIS Visitor Kiosks.

For additional information on CGIS accounts, please contact us.

Printing in our computer labs is available for valid CGIS account holders. Printing costs are:

• 5 cents per black-and-white page
• 25 cents per color page

All printing is prepaid through our Lab Help Desk via Crimson Cash, personal check, or departmental billing code.

Our Lab Help Desk has a variety of specialty papers (colors and sizes) that are available at no additional charge. Laser printer overhead transparency sheets are available for an additional charge.

Copy machines are not located in the our public labs; however, CGIS Building Operations maintains a copier outside the Concourse Computer Lab.

Our Computer Training Lab is for instructor-lead events that require students to access a computer and follow the instructor. The lab is located in room K018, on the concourse level of the CGIS Knafel guilding, and is open during alloted reservation times only. While any FAS event can request a lab reservation, the room primarily is for CGIS-affiliated departments and centers and preference is given to CGIS related events.

The room has twelve student machines and one instructor machine. There is a ceiling-mounted projector that is connected to the instructor machine by default, but a hookup to another computer, such as a laptop, is also available. The room has both white boards and chalk boards, as well as an additional table for handouts. Capacity is 12 students, but folding chairs are available to double the number of students at each computer.

The computers are 24-inch Apple iMacs, configured with both Windows and Mac OS X partitions. Login authentication for the computers is the same as our public labs. If your event is a one-time event, we can work with you to create a temporary guest login for your event.

For additional information about our Computer Training Lab, please contact us.

Our Computer Training Lab is available for reservation by email. Please contact us with the following information:

• Date and time of event (if recurring, start and end dates as well)
• Purpose of event
• Approximately number of attendees
• Primary speaker for the event
• Windows, Mac or either computer environment required
• Specific software required for event

Please note that all training computer lab users need an account to use a computer. To have individual accounts created, each person must stop by the Lab Help Desk to sign up. A valid Harvard or MIT ID is required to create an individual account. If your event is a one-time event, we can work with you to create a temporary guest login for your event. If you require this service, please contact us.

Computers this lab have both Windows and Mac OSX environments available. These environments are full OS implementations. The current Windows operating system is Windows XP Professional. The current Mac OSX operating system is 10.4 (Tiger).

Software applications available in our Computer Training Lab are a subset of the applications available in the other public labs. Currently, the following applications are installed:

• Windows:
  • Stata
  • R
  • SAS
  • SPSS
  • JMP
  • ArcGIS
  • Google Earth
  • Microsoft Office
  • Adobe Design Premium Suite CS4
  • Firefox
• Macintosh:
  • Stata
  • R
  • JMP
  • Google Earth
  • Microsoft Office
  • Adobe Acrobat
  • Firefox

Other software can be requested for an event at the time of event reservation. For additional information, please contact us.