• Login: This field is essential and must be filled in; indeed, Mallard stores student records according to their logins and so all Mallard logins must be unique. Many institutions find it convenient to have students use the same logins that they use for other official university authentication.
• Password: This field will appear only if you are running a password version of Mallard. (E.g. at UIUC we use the locally developed Bluestem authentication and faculty members do not need to do any password management.) Within the provided blank, you enter the student's initial password; she can change this password at her leisure.
• Name: User names must be provided, although they do not necessarily need to be unique (e.g. two John Smiths). Grade rosters are displayed in alphabetical order corresponding to the last names.
• Section: If your course has multiple sections you will want to be sure that each student appears on the roster of the proper section. Typically, the section entitled "Staff" would be used only for non-students. The section entitled "Other" could be used for auditors, etc.
• Access Level: Set the appropriate access level, as explained below.
• Other: This "Other" field provides a place for writing comments about specific students: telephone numbers, majors, etc.
• ID: If you need student ID information, you have the option of supplying it. (If your institution uses ID's based on social security numbers, I would suggest you not use this field at all - unless necessary.)

What Does Access Level Mean?

• Student
• Instructor - all student features plus access to gradebook utilities. This is typical "teaching assistant access level".
• Developer - all student features plus ablility to upload and create course materials and quizzes.
• Instructor/Developer - all student, instructor, and developer utilities.
• Course Director - all student, instructor, and developer utlilities, plus control of set-up, roster, lessons page, access to logfiles, etc.

Through the roster features, the course director controls each user's access level (there can be many course directors).

Because users with different access levels sometimes see different things on the same page, there is a utility which allows a course director (or an instructor or a developer) to temporarily "lower" their access level. This allows a staff person to be sure of exactly what another type of user sees. E.g., a course director can choose to (temporarily) be a student, an instructor, or a developer. And a developer or an instructor can temporarily be a student.

Scheduled for implementation in 1999 is the capability to completely control who has access to each and every utility. For instance, a head TA might be given access to all course roster functions, whereas other TAs would not have this capability.