Harvard-MIT Data Center

We provide and service three types of accounts, available to all IQSS affiliates:

• CGIS accounts - Provides access to network drives and networked printing resources
• Email accounts - Includes personal or group email accounts, as well as mailing lists
• Research Computing Environment (RCE) accounts - Provides access to the following resources:
  • RCE desktop
  • Other HMDC-managed login and computer servers
  • Concurrent Versioning System (CVS) repositories
  • Hosted website access through Secure File Transfer Protocol (SFTP) or Server Message Block (SMB) protocol

We are happy to provide accounts to qualified requesters; however, for purposes of accounting and administration, these accounts must conform to the policies described on this site. These policies are enforced programmatically during the account creation process and cannot be overridden by administrators.

Definition of Affiliates

Affiliates are defined as members of the following groups:

• Institute for Quantitative Social Science (IQSS)
• Center for Government and International Studies (CGIS)
• Faculty members of FAS social science departments and research centers
• Faculty members from Harvard's other schools in social science research
• Sponsored, approved MIT faculty and their graduate students
• Sponsored visitors

If you are a member of an affiliated group but are pursuing research in a field outside of the social sciences, and are interested in using our services, please contact us. We can work with you to determine whether we can meet your research needs.

All members of the Harvard University and approved members from MIT with valid ID cards are eligible to register for a CGIS account. Student, staff, and faculty ID cards with a future expiration date are considered valid. Other Harvard or MIT ID cards that are issued for specific activities, such as a Special Borrowers Card from the Harvard libraries, are not valid IDs. Valid ID cards must be presented at the time of account creation so that the new user's identity can be confirmed.

We reserve the right to deny accounts to any individual. All staff and faculty from departments with a support agreement with us may apply for an account. All requested information must be complete and the user must agree to abide by HMDC Policies before a new account is created.

Sponsored Accounts

Temporary logins are not available in our computer labs. People without valid Harvard or MIT IDs can be sponsored by a senior staff or faculty member.  Sponsors must be either senior administrative staff or faculty for a department, center, or school. Sponsors must be present at the time of account creation.

For additional information on sponsored accounts, please contact us.

New Account Form

If you are a new affiliate, see your Program Coordinator or IT contact to obtain your CGIS account.

If you are a Program Coordinator or an IT contact, please contact us for account creation.

To apply for a CGIS account, please print and complete the attached form and submit it to the Lab Help Desk located in room K026 of the CGIS Knafel building.

File(s): 

NewCGISAccount.pdf

Our electronic mail accounts are available for affiliated departmental personnel. Account creation is subject to the approval of the appropriate program coordinator.

We reserve the right to deny email accounts to any individual. All staff and faculty from departments that have an email services agreement with HMDC may apply for an account. All requested information must be complete and the user must agree to abide by HMDC Policies before a new account is created.

Department administrators and faculty may sponsor accounts for nonstaff affiliates, subject to HMDC and departmental administrative review. In general, students with Harvard school mail accounts (FAS, KSG, HLS, and others) should utilize those email services.

New Account Requests

If you are a new affiliate, see your Program Coordinator or IT contact to obtain your email account.

If you are a Program Coordinator or an IT contact, please contact us for account creation.

When you request an RCE account, usernames will conform to the following specifications:

• Composed of the first initial followed by the first seven characters of the last name
• No more than eight characters in length
• No nonalphabetic characters
• No spaces
• All lowercase

RCE account passwords must conform to the following restrictions:

• At least eight characters in length
• Not based on any common dictionary word
• No spaces
• Contains at least two numbers
• Contains at least two special (nonalphanumeric) characters

The Harvard PIN Service has helpful guidelines for picking a strong password.

New Account Requests

Please contact us for more information.

If you received a message informing you that your account is up for renewal or that you must change your password, please read the following paragraphs. Our policies differ depending on the account in question. In all circumstances, we attempt to provide ample forewarning of any change in account status.

CGIS Accounts

Accounts are good until the start of the following semester. We send out an account renewal notice near the beginning of each new semester explaining that your CGIS account is up for renewal, and include instructions on how to extend your access. Accounts that are not renewed are archived and deleted. We are not responsible for any data lost for archived accounts.

CGIS accounts are available for as long as a user maintains an affiliation with the sponsoring group. Only in special circumstances do we extend access for your account; otherwise at the time when the affiliation ends, the account will be disabled.

To change your CGIS account password, please refer to Changing Your CGIS Account Password.

Email Accounts

Hosted email accounts are valid for as long as the user maintains an affiliation with the sponsoring group. At the time when the affiliation ends, we disable the email account. In this event, it is your responsibility to notify correspondents of the change in address. One way to do this is to set up a vacation message that specifies a forwarding address. See Managing Vacation Messages for more information.

To change your email password, please refer to Changing Email Password.

RCE Accounts

All RCE accounts have a renewal date; this is required by administrative and security best practices. Renewal dates are selected based on the estimated end times of users' projects. These can be adjusted as schedules change, though as a general rule accounts are up for renewal at least once every year. When you see an account renewal message, please respond to it. HMDC staff need to know whether you will require continued use of your account after the expiration date, and if so, for roughly how long.

Passwords to RCE accounts also have expiration dates, which are separate from the account renewal dates. Passwords expire every six months and must be changed to ensure uninterrupted access. When you see a password expiration message, please use the included link to change your password, or refer to Setting Your Password.

If you are unable to do so, please contact us and ask that your password be reset.