Getting Started: Creating Your Lab.Computer Account

Every Lab.Computer workflow — whether you're an instructor building a course or a student submitting an assignment — starts in the same place: your account. There are two ways to get one: sign up directly at lab.computer, or launch a Lab.Computer assignment from your school's LMS and let Canvas create it for you automatically. This guide covers both paths — what each field on the standalone registration form actually controls, a few troubleshooting steps that aren't written down anywhere else yet, and where to go if your account comes from Canvas instead.

Path 1: Standalone sign-up

Lab.Computer uses a single sign-up flow for every type of user. There's no separate "instructor portal" or "student portal" — the role you pick during registration determines which dashboard sections and permissions you get afterward. That makes it worth pausing on the Role Selection step rather than clicking through it.

Step-by-step: creating your account

1. Go to lab.computer in your browser — no install or plugin is required at any point in this flow.
2. Click Sign Up in the upper-right corner of the homepage.

1. Fill in the registration form: First Name, Last Name, Email Address, and Password are all required.
2. Choose a secure password and confirm it. This is a standard email/password account.
3. Select your Role from the dropdown — the options are Student, Instructor, Administrator, IT, and Other. This choice is required and determines your dashboard: Instructor accounts see Created Courses tools for building and managing courses; Student accounts are oriented around Joined Courses.

1. Complete the CAPTCHA check and click Sign Up.

Verifying your email

Registration isn't complete until your email is verified — this is also the step people most often get stuck on, so it deserves its own walkthrough.

1. Open the inbox you registered with and look for a verification email from Lab.Computer.

1. Click the verification link inside the email. This confirms the address and activates the account.
2. Return to lab.computer and log in with your registered email and password. You'll land directly on your dashboard.

If the verification email doesn't arrive

• Check spam or junk folders first — verification mail is the most common one caught by aggressive spam rules.
• Confirm you typed the email address correctly during sign-up; a typo means the mail went nowhere.
• Give it a few minutes before requesting a new one — delivery can lag, especially on institutional email systems with their own filtering layers.

Choosing the right role

The Instructor vs. Student choice isn't cosmetic — it changes what you can do immediately after logging in.

• Instructor accounts default to the Created Courses view, with a "+ Create Course" action front and center.
• Student accounts default to the Joined Courses view, oriented around courses you've been enrolled in or have requested to join.
• Pick the role that matches what you'll actually be doing on the platform — it shapes your default dashboard from the first login.

Signing in and resetting your password

Once your account is verified, day-to-day sign-in is just email and password. If you forget your password, use the Forgot Password link on the sign-in screen to trigger a reset email, then follow the link to set a new one — the same inbox-and-spam-folder troubleshooting above applies here too.

Path 2: Through Canvas (LMS)

If your school connects Lab.Computer to Canvas, your account is created automatically the first time you launch a Lab.Computer assignment — there's no separate sign-up form to fill out and no email verification step. See Canvas Assignment Setup and Launch — Step 2 for the full walkthrough of how Canvas launches map to your Lab.Computer account, courses, and assignments.

What's next

Once you're signed in, the natural next stop depends on your role. Instructors should head straight to creating a course and enrolling students; students should look out for an invite, a public join link, or a Share ID from their instructor. Both workflows are covered in the next article in this series.