ITS - Technology Updates

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Active Directory

Craven Community College will transition to Microsoft Active Directory as our centralized authentication system for faculty and staff over the next couple of months.  Students will begin to use Active Directory to login to lab computers and Moodle starting in the spring of 2012 semester.

How this Affects You:

Migrating to a centralized authentication system will enable CCC to more easily use a wide variety of exciting new Internet-based services in the future, including Datatel Portal and single sign on.  First, we have to transition to the new system. 
In order to transition to the new Active Directory System we will need to make some modifications to your computer workstation.  Your IT department will perform all the necessary technical changes required to allow your computer to use this new system as well as provide training.  In order to minimize the impact on you, we will transition everyone in small groups.  This will give us flexibility to work around your schedule and the opportunity to provide one-on-one support.

Why:

  • Datatel Portal requires that Active Directory be in place.  Craven has been selected as one of 13 community colleges to pilot Portal.  Active Directory must be in place to implement Portal.
  • New services are becoming available to colleges over the Internet every day.  A large portion of these new services require that colleges  have mechanisms in place to authenticate access.  Active Directory provides this authentication mechanism using the industry standard LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol) and will enable CCC to offer more of these exciting new services to our faculty, staff, and students.
  •  Implementing a centralized authentication system will reduce the total number of user accounts that the system administrator must manage.  Reducing the administrative burden of maintaining a large number of user accounts also reduces the risk of improper account maintenance.

How:

Your IT department has devised a comprehensive plan to migrate all faculty and staff members to Active Directory by September 30, 2011.   The migration process will be by building and starting with the Business and Technology Building.  We will contact individuals within the buildings to find the best time within a given time period to update your computer. The process for moving each building group to Active Directory Authentication will be:

  • IT Department and group schedule a migration date.
  • Each individual is sent an e-mail with their new account’s temporary password.
  • IT department staff reconfigures workstation to authenticate using Active Directory.
  • IT department staff assist with copying files and making other configuration adjustments.
  • Individual logs in to their computer and changes their password.

Contact Information

For additional information or questions about Active Directory or the latest Technology Updates, please contact Bambi Edwards at (252) 638-7317 or edwardsb@cravencc.edu.