How the PI Can Approve a Pending Account Request

Introduction

This page is intended to guide TAMUQ PI's (Principal Investigators) in approving account requests from their research collaborators or students.

Since 2020 the account application process as well as the approval workflow for these accounts has been paper-less. Approvals and other required input is therefore gathered electronically from several stakeholders including Research Computing staff, PI's, Director Research Computing, the Export Control Office, and IT. In this document we concern ourselves only with how the PI approves any given account request. Note that the workflow does not conclude with the PI's approval, and other stakeholders must subsequently also approve an account request before an account is finally granted.

External Applicants

Applicants who are not enrolled in coursework at TAMUQ or are not on TAMUQ payroll would normally be classed as external research collaborators. TAMUQ is required to run an export control check on such applicants before clearing them for an account. This check requires the PI sponsoring the account to first answer several standard "yes-no" questions made available in an online questionnaire. A link to this questionnaire is sent to the PI via email. The header of the email looks like this:

The PI must follow a link close to the bottom of the email body to access the relevant questionnaire:

Internal (TAMUQ) Applicants

Internal TAMUQ applicants do not need to be cleared through the Export Control Office and their approval is a simple binary affair (approve or deny) with no questionnaire to answer. This approval can be granted in one of two ways: (a) responding to an email sent to you (the PI), or (b) using a web-based interface hosted on the TAMUQ IT service portal.

Approval via Email

Once a specific account request workflow determines that your approval is required for a given request, the workflow system will automatically generate and send you (the PI) an email seeking your response. The body of the email message will contain two links close to the end of the message. One will look like a green button and say "APPROVE" while the other will look like a red button which says "REJECT".

Clicking either of the two will open up a new, auto-generated email message using your default mail application (e.g. Microsoft Outlook). All you must do is to send the email (the To: field of the email header will already have the intended recipient, which is the workflow system). If you approve the application, be sure to click the APPROVE button in the email and send off the resulting message. Likewise, if you do not approve the application, you must click the REJECT button in the email and then send off the that resulting message.

Approval via IT Service Portal

Approval for internal (TAMUQ) applicants may be granted by visiting the IT service portal at https://servicenow.tamu.edu/tamuq and selecting a pending request from the "My Approvals" navigation menu at the top of the page:

Selection of a specific account request entry from this drop-down menu will lead you to a page which presents you with both an "approve" as well as a "deny" option. Clicking the appropriate button will complete the task.