Database FAQ

• About officers and signatories
• How to update officers and signatories
• How do we update our officer email list?
• What is a Kerberos name?
• Who has permission to modify our database information?
• I get an error: "Please Contact System Administrator for this error"
• The system returns a "null" error after trying to update information
• Our group name is wrong/truncated
• What are the date options for the signatories?

About officers and signatories

The Online ASA Database maintains the official list of officers for a group via four distinctive positions:

• President – Group leader. Must be a currently registered MIT student. ASA only recognizes one per group. Some groups refer to this position as “chair”, “governor”, “director”, etc.
• Treasurer – Responsible for group finances. Must be a currently registered MIT student.
• Financial Signatories - Officers of the group who are granted access to the group's funds. Only these people can process reimbursements and make charges to the group account. Financial signatories must be current members of the MIT community with a valid Kerberos ID.
• Reservation Signatories - Officers of the group who are authorized to reserve rooms on campus through the CAC, schedules office, or athletics department (DAPER).

Note: The ASA requires only a president and treasurer; as such the database only requires those positions to be filled. Other officers should be listed as signatories if they need those authorizations.

How to update officers and signatories

1. Go to: Student Group Officer Access (MIT Certificates Required)
2. The ASA Student Group Officer page will appear
3. Under Select Your Student Group you will see a list of groups to which you have permissions.
4. Click on the name of the group that you would like to edit.
5. The Maintain Student Group Info page appears
6. Select one of:
• Reservation Signatories
• Financial Signatories
• Student Group Main Info (President/Treasurer)

How do we update our officer email list?

If you need to change the officer email list that is listed in the ASA database, please contact the ASA Executive Board. We cannot update the members of your officer email list, please see the IS&T mailing list page for more info about changing the list members.

What is the Kerberos name?

This is the portion of your email address before the @mit.edu, e.g. the Kerberos name for joeuser@mit.edu is joeuser.

Who has permission to modify our database information?

The people who have permission to modify the database are those who are already listed in it. It is not related to the members of your group’s email list. It is very important that old officers add new officers to the database after elections.

These people can modify your group’s information:

• President listed in the database
• Treasurer listed in the database
• Financial signatories listed in the database
• Reservation signatories listed in the database (limited permissions)

I get an error: "Please Contact System Administrator for this error"

Before contacting the System Administrator:

1. Try to restart your browser.
2. Verify that you have permissions to modify a student group. Talk to the other officers in the group and ask them to verify that you are listed as an officer or signatory.

If both of those options don’t help, then send email to asa-db@mit.edu and include the following information:

• GROUP NAME
• Browser name and version
• List of URL’s of pages you tried to access
• Any other relevant information about what you were trying to do

The system returns a "null" error after trying to update information

There are two possible causes for this error:

1. The president or treasurer Kerberos ID is incorrect.
2. The group description is too long. It is currently limited to 50 characters.

If both of those options don’t help, then send email to asa-db@mit.edu and include the following information:

• GROUP NAME
• Browser name and version
• URL of page you were using before the error
• Any other relevant information about what you were trying to do

Our group name is wrong/truncated

There once was a bug in the database that truncated all group names to 25 characters. The bug has been fixed, but we have not fixed all the group names. Please contact the ASA Executive Board and they will fix your group’s name for you.

What are the date options for the signatories?

The "Effective Date" and "Expiration Date" are optional:

• No "effective date" will default to "today"
• No "expiration date" means the signatory will remain active until "expire?" is selected manually

The "DD-MMM-YY" format specified for signatories is:

• DD = two digit numerical day of month (01 – 12)
• MMM = three character abbreviation of month (JAN-DEC)
• YY = two digit year (e.g. 06)

Example: 01-JAN-05