UNET offers a standard University of Maine System account and several types of special purpose accounts. The special purpose accounts include administrative accounts and mainframe (CMS) research accounts. For more information on these accounts, please contact the UNET Help Desk at (207) 561-3587 or write to support@lists.maine.edu.
The standard UMS (UNET) account provides an e-mail address and access to the Internet via the UNET modem pools. Employees (faculty, staff and student employees on all the campuses) use their UMS accounts to sign in to the online human resources system. See the document list for information on how to use these services.
The UMS account provides an e-mail address. If the student or employee has an account id or user name of jane.doe, then the e-mail address associated with the account is jane.doe@maine.edu. This e-mail address will be used to send employees important information. It is incumbent on employees to either check mail on their UMS accounts or forward mail sent to this maine.edu address to another e-mail address they check regularly. The UNET account management page enables the account holder to forward mail to another e-mail address, change his/her password, check how much modem time has been used, and gives direct web-based access to UMS account e-mail.
Anyone registered or accepted as a student at any of the campuses of the University of Maine System (or any person taking courses through a UNET Center or ITV Site) is given a UMS account. The account will be valid as long as the student is registered. Once the student is no longer in our student database, the account will be removed.
All employees of the University of Maine System (any campus, the System or other University organization) have been assigned UMS accounts. In the case where the employee has more than one UMS account, one will be designated the "primary" account - the primary account is used for signing in to the HR system, and where important e-mail may be sent.
Employees can apply for special purpose accounts - for example, mainframe research or administrative accounts. These special accounts are assigned on a need basis only. To apply, send e-mail to lee@maine.edu or operations@maine.edu. Operations staff can be reached at 207-581-3552.
New students and employees are assigned inactive accounts when they first register or are hired. The inactive accounts cannot be used until the student or employee goes through an "account activation" process.
To activate an account, the account holder uses his/her id number (student id number or employee number), and a special "activation key." As part of the registration process, each new student is sent a letter containing his/her user name and an activation key. New employees will be contacted and given their activation keys. Employees and students can also obtain activation keys from the computer helpdesk on their campus.
Once the activation key is obtained, to activate the account, the employee or student uses a web browser on an Internet connected computer to visit the activation web page: http://www.maine.edu/useraccount.html When an account is activated, the account owner sets a password for the account. This password must be at least 6 characters long and may not be all letters or all numbers (use a mixture).
Once the account is activated, the student or employee can use it. The account will remain active as long as the person continues to be a student or employee. During the activation process the account holder supplies three questions and answers. These can be used to reset the password if the student or employee forgets it. To reset a password, visit the web page mentioned above: http://www.maine.edu/useraccount.html.
If a student is also taking a course offered via the Blackboard online course system, the UMS account is used to create the Blackboard account.
A UMS account carries with it an e-mail address that ends in "@maine.edu". For an employee, the e-mail address associated with his/her primary UMS account is especially significant, because it is stored in the human resources system as the "business e-mail address" and is used to distribute important information. The employee is responsible for checking for mail at this address or for having mail forwarded to another address he/she uses.
E-mail is checked using a "mail client." A mail client program is a program that runs on the Internet (so to use it your machine needs to be connected to the Internet), and acts as an agent between you and the mail server machine. The UNET mail server machine is called mail.maine.edu. This machine handles both incoming (POP and IMAP) and outgoing (SMTP) mail services.
If you use UMS e-mail but use a different (non-University) service to connect to the Internet (for example a commercial ISP), then for your outgoing mail server you need to use a server provided by your ISP. You will still use the UNET server for incoming (POP or IMAP) mail.
For detailed information on how to set up an e-mail client program to access mail sent to your UMS account, please refer to the documents list.
If you have more than one e-mail account, you may wish to forward your UMS account e-mail to another account. This will allow you to read all your e-mail by accessing just one e-mail account. To forward your UMS mail to a different account, go to web page http://mail.maine.edu, and click the link labeled "Change your UNET Account Mail Forwarding." Once the mail forwarding has been turned on, new mail coming to your UMS account will be automatically forwarded to the address you have specified. Mail received prior to setting the forwarding address will remain at your UMS e-mail address.
All types of UMS accounts except the special administrative ones carry with them the ability to use the UNET modem pools to connect to the Internet. UNET provides detailed instructions on how to set up a Windows or Macintosh microcomputer to use dialup access.
For online information about connecting a Macintosh to the Internet via modem, refer to the Macintosh documentation. For Windows machines, see the Windows document. For more general information on dialup connections please see the documents list.
By managing your account we mean keeping the password secure, checking your monthly modem usage, and controlling the amount of disk space your account is using on the mail server and/or mainframe computer.
Every account has an "id" (also called a "userid" or "user name") and a password. The userid is the first part of your UMS e-mail address. It is usually made up out of your name. The password is initially set by you when you activate your account.
Your userid and password let you connect to the Internet via modem, send and receive e-mail, and perhaps logon and use the mainframe computer.
Anyone who knows both your userid and your password can use your account, get your private e-mail, and otherwise misbehave in your name. Therefore, it is in your interest to keep your account secure, which means keeping your password secret (your userid is public since it's part of your e-mail address).
UNET recommends that users change their passwords regularly to keep them secure. We enforce this for mainframe accounts, by expiring the passwords. Mainframe (CMS) passwords expire every 150 days.
E-mail account users are not required to change their passwords at this time (this policy may change). However, UNET strongly recommends that the passwords be changed. To do this, connect to the Internet and, using a WWW browser, go to the Web page at: http://www.maine.edu/useraccount.html.
When selecting a new password, we recommend that you avoid common words and names closely associated with you (e.g. your last name would be a very bad choice). Make the password at least 6 characters long, and use a mix of letters and numbers.
The UNET modem pools are available for use by anyone with a UMS account. Each account can use any UNET modem pool for 50 hours of total connect time per month without charge.
An account holder can check his/her total for the current month (and past months) plus see a detailed report on each connection by using a Web browser (Netscape, Internet Explorer, etc.) to view a personal dialup use report. To view your report, enter your userid and password when requested. This report is also accessible using the standard account management web page at http://www.maine.edu/useraccount.html.
If an account has exceeded the monthly allocation of 50 hours on UNET modem pools, the account will no longer be allowed to dialup until the user has made an arrangement for extended hours with his/her campus. Contact your campus computing support staff for how to do this on your campus. There is a charge for hours beyond the basic 50 (currently $.30/hour). Once a new month starts the account has another free 50 hours, unless there is an outstanding bill.
UMS accounts store e-mail on the mail server machine (mail.maine.edu) as it arrives (incoming mail only). UNET expects account users to run an e-mail program like Eudora or Pegasus on a regular basis to read and delete mail from the server. If mail is not deleted, it can accumulate until the account holder's space on the server is full. UNET sends warning letters when the user's space quota is 90% full. If the quota is exceeded, no more mail for that account is accepted. Note that documents attached to e-mail are stored with the letters and contribute to filling the space.
A user can see what letters are stored on the mail server by using the web-based mail interface: https://mail.maine.edu/imp. This interface provides a simple mail tool that can be used to read and send e-mail using a Web browser. Letters can be opened by clicking on their subject lines. Clicking the "delete" button for a letter will "mark" it for deletion. In the list of letters you will find a button labeled "expunge" which will remove all letters marked for deletion.
Your campus computing center runs a helpdesk with staff who can assist you. In addition, UNET consultants provide help for UMS account holders: phone (207) 561-3587 or send e-mail to support@lists.maine.edu