Locking Workstations in MCECS Computer Labs

Computers in general access labs are shared resources, so be considerate of others’ needs. We provide these guidelines below to define what “being considerate” means. If you don’t follow these guidelines, the CAT may terminate your login session (log you out), and you may lose work in any open documents because of it.

The following basic guidelines apply to locking workstations in general-access MCECS computer labs.

  • You may only lock one workstation at a time.

  • Limit lock times to 10-15 minutes and leave a note on the  keyboard with:

    • Your login name
    • The time you locked the station
    • The reason you locked the station

  • Do not lock workstations when the lab is full and there are students waiting to use a computer.

  • Do not lock workstations with scarce resources, like:

    • Scanners
    • Design software (Adobe Acrobat Pro, Adobe Creative Cloud – such as Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver)
    • ECE processor boards

  • Be ware that we may need to reboot machines for security patches, hardware changes, or software upgrades. If we do so, your lock will be broken and your session terminated.

  • If there is a lab is reserved, all locked sessions will be removed.

If you need to lock a workstation for longer than 10-15 minutes to run a program for a class project, follow our Long Running Job guidelines.