Monday, August 18, 2008

Simple Username and Password Management

AddThis Feed ButtonOne problem our school's technology committee began working on is how to handle the exorbitant number of username/passwords we as teachers have accumulated for the numerous off- and online applications we use: from Accelerated Reader to UnitedStreaming, there are at least 20 different applications or websites that require a username/password or some long website address we may or may not remember in our moment of need. 

One low-tech but effective solution, suggested by Mike (Mr. K as he's known to students) is to design an editable username/password table in Excel spreadsheet which can then be e-mailed to the entire staff. The form will come be pre-filled with our school's most commonly used applications and website addresses leaving the username/password column blank. Teachers can simply input their own unique username/password in the appropriate row, save the file on their computer desktop or print it out. They can tape this under their laptop or stick it in a file in their desk. It's kind of like having our own personal phonebook for our username/passwords.

One word of caution: This solution is not recommended for critical data such as online banking, Amazon, or other sensitive information.

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