IU RDC usage policies

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Accounts

The Indiana University Research Database Complex (RDC) supports research-related MySQL and PostgreSQL databases and data-intensive applications that require databases. The RDC is strictly devoted to supporting research, and is not an instructional, classroom environment.

Access to the RDC is available to all IU graduate students, faculty, and staff. Undergraduate students and non-IU collaborators need IU faculty sponsors to get access.

To create a database on the RDC, submit the RDC Database Account Application.

When your database login has been created, you will receive a confirmation message in email with your login and information about connecting to your database. You will need to renew your database account annually.

By submitting the RDC Database Account Application, you will be affirming that:

  • You understand the database is to be used only for research purposes.
  • You agree to not store Critical data (except for ePHI data) on RDC databases.
  • You will acknowledge use of IU's high performance computing systems in publications resulting from your research.
  • You will provide periodic listings of citations of those publications upon request.
  • You agree to annually renew your RDC account.

Database group accounts are used on the RDC. Although you are not allowed to use a group account for regular data access, group accounts are often the best process for administering a database that is used by a project or team. The RDC Database Account Application lets you specify a database group account. When you request a database group account:

  • You must first have an IU username for your group.
  • You will be considered the responsible party for the group database account.
  • You must create additional logins for all access to data, and you must ensure that the database group account is never used for data access. It should only be used to administer user logins, schemas, and permissions.

For more, see About IU computing accounts for groups or departments.

Database security

HIPAA

This UITS system or service meets certain requirements established in the HIPAA Security Rule thereby enabling its use for work involving data that contain protected health information (PHI). However, using this system or service does not fulfill your legal responsibilities for protecting the privacy and security of data that contain PHI. You may use this system or service for work involving data that contain PHI only if you institute additional administrative, physical, and technical safeguards that complement those UITS already has in place.

For more, see Your legal responsibilities for protecting data containing protected health information (PHI) when using UITS Research Technologies systems and services.

Note:
In accordance with standards for access control mandated by the HIPAA Security Rule, you are not permitted to access data containing protected health information (PHI) using a group (or departmental) account. To ensure accountability and maintain appropriate levels of access control, all users must use an individual login for all work involving PHI.

If you have questions about securing HIPAA-regulated research data at IU, email securemyresearch@iu.edu. SecureMyResearch provides self-service resources and one-on-one consulting to help IU researchers, faculty, and staff meet cybersecurity and compliance requirements for processing, storing, and sharing regulated and unregulated research data; for more, see About SecureMyResearch. To learn more about properly ensuring the safe handling of PHI on UITS systems, see the UITS IT Training video Securing HIPAA Workflows on UITS Systems. To learn about division of responsibilities for securing PHI, see Shared responsibility model for securing PHI on UITS systems.

Passwords

Once your RDC Database Account Application is processed, you will receive a confirmation email message that describes how to access your database. Your initial database password will be sent under separate cover as a second email message.

For security reasons, when using a command-line client to connect to your MySQL database, do not enter your database password on the MySQL command line. Follow the instructions in Access your MySQL database at IU RDC.

Responsibilities

You are responsible for:

  • Creating and managing your schemas and schema objects (for example, tables, views, procedures, triggers, and schema privileges)
  • Creating and managing user logins for your databases (see the previous Database security note about maintaining appropriate access for sensitive data, including PHI)
  • Changing datatypes
  • Any data processes, such as data imports, deletes, modifications, transformations, and retrievals
  • Creating and maintaining copies of scripts
  • Emailing the RDC Administration team (rdcadmin@iu.edu) about changes in space or database administration, or if you no longer need access to the research database
  • Adapting your schema and data as required during system and database upgrades
  • Adapting client applications and tools to system and database versions

RDC database administrators are responsible for:

  • Managing space allocation
  • Monitoring and reporting database performance
  • Monitoring and reporting invalid schema objects
  • Installing database and system upgrades and patches

If you have questions or need help, email the RDC Administration team (rdcadmin@iu.edu).

Acknowledging grant support

The Indiana University cyberinfrastructure, managed by the Research Technologies division of UITS, is supported by funding from several grants, each of which requires you to acknowledge its support in all presentations and published works stemming from research it has helped to fund. Conscientious acknowledgment of support from past grants also enhances the chances of IU's research community securing funding from grants in the future. For the acknowledgment statement(s) required for scholarly printed works, web pages, talks, online publications, and other presentations that make use of this and/or other grant-funded systems at IU, see Sources of funding to acknowledge in published work if you use IU's research cyberinfrastructure.

Database backup and recovery

Backups for MySQL database servers on the RDC are the responsibility of the user. UITS recommends using MySQL's mysqldump command; for more, see mysqldump - A Database Backup Program in the MySQL documentation.

Scheduled downtime

The RDC's maintenance window is the third Sunday of each month, 12am-6am. Make sure to plan for this downtime each month. Notice of any emergency downtime will be posted at Status.IU.

Disk space for data loading and other applications

If you need space on the RDC for staging data, or for data-related packages and applications, email the RDC Administration team (rdcadmin@iu.edu), which will evaluate requests on a case-by-case basis.

Mail usage

Production mail service is not provided on the RDC.

Reporting problems

To report a problem with the RDC, email the RDC Administration team (rdcadmin@iu.edu) with the following information:

  • The name of the database server to which you were connecting
  • A description of what you were trying to do
  • A description of the problem
  • The name and version of the tool you were using to connect to the database server
  • Your computer's operating system
  • The error message number and text, if applicable
  • The time the problem occurred

Support staff are available from approximately 8am-5pm Monday-Friday.

Questions and comments

UITS established the policies described in this document with the goal of providing a stable, powerful, and efficient research database environment for IU graduate students, faculty, and staff. If you have a question or comment about these policies, email the RDC Administration team (rdcadmin@iu.edu).

This is document awmi in the Knowledge Base.
Last modified on 2024-02-05 13:13:55.