Overview
Duplicate person records represent multiple person records that are assigned the same username and/or primary (edu) email address.
Sometimes a user has duplicate records in SS&E causing the user to not be able to log in (since the system does not know who is trying to log in) or LMS data to sync with the "wrong" record and not display properly on the UI.
Below steps explain how to remove information from a "duplicate" person record so that the user can log in and LMS data is associated with the proper person record.
NOTE: The following steps require Administrative access to SS&E Administration.
How to search and Override a Duplicate Person Record under Administration
- Navigate to Administration - People & Roles - People.
- Search for the duplicate Person by searching for multiple records associated with the same email. Identify the duplicate person record(s).
- Enter the "duplicate" Person ID.
- Search for each duplicate person that is not the "correct" person that is having trouble logging in or missing data from the LMS on their Courses tab.
- Select a duplicate Person record.
- For each duplicate person record, from their User Details page, select the Override menu from the top menu bar.
- To override a duplicate Username, enter a fake value, or enter a blank space into the field to enter a blank username.
- To override a duplicate Email Address, enter a fake value, update to the correct email address, or enter a blank space into the field to enter a blank email address.
- If the LMS is syncing with the wrong SS&E user, it is most likely that the LMS Id is associated with the wrong user. To remove a Person LMS ID association, enter a blank space on the "duplicate" user's Override menu in the LMS Id field.
- Click Save on the Override menu.
- After entering/saving a blank space override value, verify that the "empty" override value is saved by noting that the Override field is empty and shaded in gray.
- The Override value will overwrite the username/email address in the database, and will also override these fields each time the data feeds are read from your SIS so that Person records will always show the overridden username/email address unless they are manually removed from the Override menu.
- If you choose to manually remove a Person Override value, this will not affect records until after the next SIS import runs (typically 4 times per day).
How to search duplicate records on a report
The following steps help create a report using the Person report source in SS&E. Once generated, the results are exported to MS Excel or Google Sheets for data analysis.
If duplicates are found, these should be resolved so that SS&E is able to properly identify the user trying to log in.
- Check if there are duplicate person records or different users with the same first name/last name.
- If there are multiple users with the same full name, as long as they have different email addresses and different usernames it is not an issue.
- More information about troubleshooting login issues can be found here.
Please refer to the below steps:
- Create a new report using the Person report source.
- From the Reports page, select +New Report, then select the "Person" report source to create a new report searching on all People in the SS&E database.
- Enter a report name (such as "Find Duplicate Person Records").
- Remove all the pre-populated columns and add the following columns:
- ID [Person]
- First Name [Person]
- Last Name [Person]
- Username [Person]
- Save the report.
- Run the report.
- Export the report to Excel.
- Open/Upload the report in Excel or Google Sheets.
- To find duplicate records in Google Sheets:
- Select the entire data range by highlighting the data displayed in all four columns, excluding the header row.
- Sort the data by last name.
- Data - Sort range - Advanced range sorting options -Sort by Column C ("last name" data), select "Sort".
- From the menu bar, select Format - Conditional Formatting.
- From the menu that pops up on the right side, select "Add another rule".
- The "Apply to range" will be prepopulated with the data range selected in step 1.
- Under "Format Rules - Format cells if...", scroll down to select "Custom formula is" from the dropdown.
- In the Value field, copy the following formula to highlight all records that have a different Person Id with a matching "first name, last name" =COUNTIFS($B2:$B,$B2,$C2:$C,$C2)1.
- To search for Person records with a duplicate username, copy the following formula: =COUNTIFS($D2:$D,$D2)1.
- Under "Formatting style", select the paint bucket and select the color to use on duplicates.
- Select Done to view the results.
Deactivating/Removing (Archiving) a Person Record
If removing information via Override is not sufficient, you can mark the duplicate users "Inactive".
If using the Override menu and marking users as Inactive is not enough, there is no way to fully remove a user from being searched upon within SS&E Administration.
In order to completely remove a user from being seen on the UI, this requires an escalation to the Professional Services team to remove identifying information directly from the database.
For more information about deactivating and archiving a person record, click here.