Faculty of Biological Sciences IT Induction Information

The Faculty IT support team are based on Level 10 of the Garstang building. They should be the first point of contact for all IT enquiries and fault reporting.

Please include in your request:

  • An informative subject line, not one word. E.g. “laptop” or “pc problem” are not very helpful.
  • As much detail as possible about the problem, e.g. error messages, software versions and also the location: room number and building, computer name, operating system, your full name and contact details.

Please use your university e-mail address for all IT requests as we can check this information easily which in turn allows us to help you more effectively.

All calls or enquiries to the helpdesk will be logged on the helpdesk system. A numbered ticket is automatically emailed to the requester to allow the progress of the work to be tracked.

UNIX faults can be reported directly via

Macintosh faults can be reported directly to

Requests for work on Faculty web pages can be made directly to

Obtaining a University computer account and username

All new members of staff must complete an electronic application for a Computer Username available at the following URL:

On submitting the form the username and an initial password are returned onscreen, please note these down. Accounts are usually active within one to two working days.

Please see the following link for Conditions of Use of Computer Systems Policy and related security policies.

Accessing University e-mail accounts

All new staff mail-boxes are created on the University’s Office 365 platform and can be accessed using the Outlook mail client on any University PC.

E-mail can also be accessed both on- and off-campus from any computer with an internet connection by using the Outlook Web App at the following URL:-

To log in to your e-mail you should type your username in the format .

Further information about the University’s e-mail service, including how to set up your mobile devices for e-mail, is available here:-

Secure storage of data

All new members of Faculty staff have a secure network storage area or H:\ drive for saving their work files when they login to the DS domain. This is backed upon a scheduled basis. Each user has a quota of 20GB, although this can be extended if necessary, with each request being considered on a case by case basis. Please note that the H:\ drive should only be used to store work files, and should NOT be used to store personal documents, music files, pictures etc: the H drive is the default location for “My Documents” and this includes the “My Pictures” and “My Music” folders.

Some groups have access to an S:\ drive or shared area. This is for storage of data that is shared between colleagues in a research group or Faculty support area. There is also additional data storage on the S drive for PIs and their groups’ research data; further information is available on the intranet:

External drives are not recommended for data storage.

Access to UNIX/Linux

Members of FBS who wish to gain access to the Faculty UNIX/Linux facilities need to fill in a white Faculty Username form and return it to UNIX Support via the Faculty IT Helpdesk. An online form can be completed electronically and is available at the following URL

Ordering software and IT equipment

All orders for IT equipment, peripherals, accessories and software must be made through the Faculty IT helpdesk. This includes University internal requisitions. Requests can be submitted directly to by using the IT request web form. There are also IT purchasing web pages for submitting orders for Faculty standard models of PCs and laptops.

The Faculty IT support team is responsible for compliance with licensing agreements for all software installed on computers in the Faculty. Any software packages that are not availableinternally are purchased from specific vendors and licenses registered to the Faculty. A list of packages available for installation on University owned computers and also for use on privately owned PCs and laptops is available from:

Connecting personal laptops/mobile devices to the University network

The provision of wired networking for privately owned laptops is not available to Faculty staff.

Staff may access the wireless LAN (Eduroam) using their University log-on details, and subsequently gain access to other University-only services using the Virtual Private Network (VPN) facility, providing they have registered to use this service. This does not require any verification of equipment by Faculty IT staff. Please see the following link for further information regarding the University’s Wireless network.

Please bear in mind that the Faculty IT team are unable to provide support for personal laptops. Additionally classified data,as defined in the University Information Protection Policy, must not be stored on privately-owned computers and equipment.

How to correct your contact details on the Faculty webpage

There is a “self service” page on the Faculty intranet that allows you to add or modify your own contact details as returned by the “staff” search.

These details are also used to auto-complete the IT request form.