Information for new users

Owned by Jia Wen Li
Last updated: Dec 09, 2021
2 min read

Overview

The University of Waterloo follows a practice of distributed management of its computing resources. The university's business systems and most academic support staff are supported by Information Systems & Technology (IST). IST also provides services to the general campus community (e.g., service desks, site licensed software distribution, computer hardware and software repairs) through the IST Service Desk.

Academic faculties provide computing infrastructure and support to suit their own requirements. General computing accounts for daily use are provided through your specific faculty or department. These accounts are given access to locally managed resources such as email, web space, file storage and printing.

WatIAM

The online campus directory, University of Waterloo Identity and Access Management (WatIAM), contains contact information about members of the campus community (students, faculty and staff). Every member of the uWaterloo community has a unique user ID.

For important user information, including the "@uwaterloo.ca" email address used for official communications, see the WatIAM campus directory information page.

Personal computers

This website contains information on maintaining your machine and using it in conjunction with campus computing services.

If you are new to the university, you should explore what services your faculty computing department offers before investing in a home machine or printer.

Student systems

If you are a student, your WatIAM user ID and password give you access to the following student administration systems:

  • Quest - the student information system at Waterloo. It is used for course enrolment, student records, financial and administrative information.

  • WaterlooWorks - the online co-op job placement system.

  • Waterloo LEARN - a web-based learning management system that enables instructors to manage course materials and interact easily and efficiently with their students. It can function both as a complement to traditional on-campus courses and as a platform for hybrid, fully online, and distance learning.

Administration systems

If you are a uWaterloo employee, you must use your WatIAM user ID and password to access payroll and benefits information via Workday.

If you are a uWaterloo faculty member, you may obtain information about courses that you teach through the Quest student information system.

General computing accounts

Waterloo Nexus is the main student computing environment, used by all six faculties. It is a large network of PC's running Windows, with a wide variety of software.

Students may roam freely among most of the Nexus labs on campus. Nexus accounts/passwords are now the same as your WatIAM user ID and password. In order to use any Nexus workstation you only need to login with the account and password that you use to login to LEARN, Waterloo Mail, etc.

Email accounts, web space, file storage, and printing are all provided by your faculty, so you should visit your faculty service desk for support.

Wireless computing

To connect wirelessly to the campus network you need to authenticate yourself with your full uWaterloo email address in the form "userID@uwaterloo.ca" against the eduroam wireless network.

More information about troubleshooting wireless connections, printing over wireless, and using your own PC to connect to campus computing services is found on our Connecting to the eduroam wireless network web page.