Senso.cloud vs Impero

[mavhc]

Any Impero users switched to/tested Senso, Jonathan Valentine's (creator of Impero) new software?

 

Looks like it's a rewrite of Impero, which, judging from the bugs in Impero, it desperately needed.

[ptotham]

Hi Mavhc

 

I was heavy user of impero at my last school but am testing senso at my new school, for me Impero had gone as far as it could go and services\supports was starting to slip, senso.cloud is the way forward especially in schools and their ever decreasing budgets with the fact that senso.cloud is module base so I can pick what modules i want to have is big plus in my book.

[tj2419]

I have trialled Senso and love the way it is going. Would love to sign up now but having purchased a perpetual licence for Impero 11 months ago there is no way my bursar will let me switch after spending that much on impero. Just wish Senso had been an option

 

More than happy to use it for free, if anyone is listening

[ITBadger]

Having been a customer of Impero's since the early days (version 1 I believe) I've been saddened to see the issues that they've faced in the last 18 months. I completely agree with @ptotham in feeling that Impero seem have gone as far as they can at the moment. I was asked to help beta test Senso and have been very impressed, not just with the software, but with the level of support and openness to suggestions that Senso provide. The software is modular, runs in the cloud, and already has many of the features of Impero. Crucially for me however, it feels as though it will continue to add features and value rather than cause us headaches which unfortunately Impero did for the last couple of years (so much so that we downgraded to an older, more stable version and refused further upgrades).

 

My Impero contract was due for renewal in May, but I have signed up with Senso. Impero didn't seem too bothered by losing another customer and didn't reply to my e-mail informing them that I wouldn't be renewing my support agreement.

 

I strongly believe that Senso will eclipse Impero in terms of functionality in the next 12 months, and they already have done so in terms of support.

 

For me at least, Impero is dead, long live Senso!

[FragglePete]

We're testing Senso at the moment, and we too are were early adopters of Impero. I just don't like the way Impero are doing business at the moment, support costs are just going up and up and the product just seems to break with each release. So far I'm liking what Senso has and I've been speaking directly with Jon V about what is coming. The product is very close to being a viable alternative; once I see the safeguarding module and website blocking in place then I'm in.

 

Decision time will be towards the end of April when our Impero renewal is due. But if I know Jon, then it's going to be fantastic! (As long as the price doesn't go silly!)

 

Pete

[mavhc]

WRT website blocking, that seems to be the hardest part, got to have a chrome, IE, firefox, and Edge plugin, and cope with all the weird differences. If I were doing it I'd partner with an adblocking program as they've probably already figured out the underlying details.

 

Impero's IE plugin works well, but nothing for Edge, and Chrome one is easy to bypass

[jon-senso]

WRT website blocking, that seems to be the hardest part, got to have a chrome, IE, firefox, and Edge plugin, and cope with all the weird differences. If I were doing it I'd partner with an adblocking program as they've probably already figured out the underlying details.

 

Impero's IE plugin works well, but nothing for Edge, and Chrome one is easy to bypass

 

 

 

Hi everyone, to be clear i'm not a sponsor of the forum but I would like to respond to @mavhc question about website blocking.

We have completed our website blocking module (in testing) and it does not require any plugins. It works with all apps, inc. Edge... please see our linkedin post for a screenshot.

Many thanks.

[NB9457]

Looks interesting, with it being cloud based I'm assuming Senso depends soley upon a web connection or is it able to work offline it in an internet outage?

[Arthur]

WRT website blocking, that seems to be the hardest part, got to have a Chrome, IE, Firefox, and Edge plugin, and cope with all the weird differences.

Perhaps it would be easier to do what AdGuard does and proxy all traffic through a separate app (at least for Windows and macOS)? You wouldn't need any extensions then.

 

That said, the WebExtensions API should make it easier to write extensions that work across all major browsers.

 

Edit. Just refreshed and saw jon-senso's post.

Edited April 4, 2017 by Arthur

[KibosJ]

This looks really interesting, may look into this. We've also bought perpetual licensing with Impero recently, but will definitely take a good look at this once the support has ended.

 

@mavhc How is the chrome plugin easy to bypass? I don't believe we've had students bypass the plugin, we have a policy that force installs it and it can't be removed, we also block Firefox and Edge for everyone.

Edited April 4, 2017 by KibosJ

[kidpressingbuttons]

The biggest feature we are looking for is if senso will be able to monitor ipads- impero does but we dont have enough licenses currently.

We are due for renewal with impero this year and not looking to renew with them as impero has just become so buggy!

[mavhc]

Does anyone actually use the ipad monitoring? Seems rather limited, by the OS.

 

KibosJ: I've had issues blocking urls instead of titles, and also iframes

[KibosJ]

Does anyone actually use the ipad monitoring? Seems rather limited, by the OS.

 

KibosJ: I've had issues blocking urls instead of titles, and also iframes

 

Ahh, we don't really use it much for URLs, we let Smoothwall do all of that. I think i remember iframes being an issue though.

[clockend25]

Been playing around with Senso and like the look of it. I like the pricing even more! We're expanding our site this summer and we'd be able to cover these new devices and still have money to spare versus the current cost of Impero. Our Impero subscription expires this summer and I'm not inclined to renew; the product has become flakey and after asking our new account manage for some updated pricing and some responses to my concerns I've heard nothing.

 

Looks like we'd have to put something else in place for power management, but otherwise Senso seems to tick a lot of the boxes.

[ITBadger]

I've been speaking to them about power management and it seems to be a case of 'when' rather than 'if'. It may require some kind of local server agent which goes against the cloud model, but this could be utilised to make improvements / as a backup connection mechanism. I'm encouraged that they are listening to our requests without rushing things out before testing properly.

[FragglePete]

All the features that I've asked about in Senso I've been told.... "Yep, that'll be happening" - and some have started to appear. Safeguarding is coming along nicely. We've taken the plunge and not renewed our Impero Support contract this year and looking to be fully paid up with Senso from September.

 

Just don't like the way Impero is going; things keep breaking and fed up with hearing the "We know about that, it'll be fixed in the next release".

 

Pete

[tdobeirne]

How does Senso.cloud perform being run in the cloud? I'd be a bit concerned about lag times for things like remote control and screen broadcasting - anyone got any experience of this?

 

Tom

[jon-senso]

Hi @NB9457 , the management console is a web based portal so without internet it will only continue to do what it was doing, such as viewing screens etc, which does not need an internet connection once the negotiation is made. The client will continue to operate offline and sync when there is a network connection.

@tdobeirne lag times should be zero, especially for real time stuff such as remote control... the system connects direct from browser to student machine where possible(after the initial SSL negotiation via the cloud servers). If you have a highly restrictive firewall between the student and your browser or you are wanting to manage the computers in school from outside of school, then it will route via the geo-located cloud servers (which are very low-latency). Hope that helps.

[NB9457]

Hi @NB9457 , the management console is a web based portal so without internet it will only continue to do what it was doing, such as viewing screens etc, which does not need an internet connection once the negotiation is made. The client will continue to operate offline and sync when there is a network connection.

@tdobeirne lag times should be zero, especially for real time stuff such as remote control... the system connects direct from browser to student machine where possible(after the initial SSL negotiation via the cloud servers). If you have a highly restrictive firewall between the student and your browser or you are wanting to manage the computers in school from outside of school, then it will route via the geo-located cloud servers (which are very low-latency). Hope that helps.

So all screen casting traffic is local and commands? Sounds good. Will there ever be a local version or some kind of connector in case of internet issues?

[uu2]

@jon-senso, I'd be interested in signing up but some of our SLT have questioned Senso's credibility because it isn't listed here. Would you be willing to complete the declaration form to confirm that Senso meets the national standards?

[NB9457]

yes, but commands will route through the cloud servers for auditing... so that teacher who shut down all the machines in their class cannot blame you

 

We are building a local agent to help with things like wake on lan as this cannot go through internet, but the senso power is in the cloud so we cannot make the whole thing LAN based... i left/sold Impero(LAN based) as i saw the future being cloud, especially for trusts etc. Plus, no more licensing issues or corrupt server files to deal with

 

Any other questions, dont hesitate to ask... im not a sponsor so cant advertise or hijack threads...i can only respond to questions ☹

 

I'm very much liking the sound of it so far, Impero has been having too many issues as of late

[Fazza]

It sounds like this is becoming a very serious contender to Impero which (lets be honest) a lot of us here are becoming more and more fed up with not working properly all the time.

 

It doesn't sound like Senso has all the features we need right now, but it does sound like they are working on adding a lot of things ASAP so we shall see what it's like in September when it's a couple of months away from our Impero renewal...

[NB9457]

It sounds like this is becoming a very serious contender to Impero which (lets be honest) a lot of us here are becoming more and more fed up with not working properly all the time.

 

It doesn't sound like Senso has all the features we need right now, but it does sound like they are working on adding a lot of things ASAP so we shall see what it's like in September when it's a couple of months away from our Impero renewal...

It is quite sad, but true, the last couple major releases we have had issues, they get corrected for the most part but it never seems to 'just work' anymore.

[FragglePete]

I'm very much liking the sound of it so far, Impero has been having too many issues as of late

 

Tell me about it, that's why we haven't renewed and are going with Senso from September. As I've said here and will keep saying Jon will deliver a superb product and WILL listen to what we want and make it happen.

 

Our Impero Server decided to dump all it's policies yesterday leaving us completely wide open - thankfully managed to do a restore from an automated backup and now everything is working again, but we're finding the blocking becoming unreliable, especially with Chrome.

 

Pete

[speckytecky]

Best become a sponsor then @jon-senso I reckon the outlay will pay hefty dividends

 

yes, but commands will route through the cloud servers for auditing... so that teacher who shut down all the machines in their class cannot blame you

 

We are building a local agent to help with things like wake on lan as this cannot go through internet, but the senso power is in the cloud so we cannot make the whole thing LAN based... i left/sold Impero(LAN based) as i saw the future being cloud, especially for trusts etc. Plus, no more licensing issues or corrupt server files to deal with

 

Any other questions, dont hesitate to ask... im not a sponsor so cant advertise or hijack threads...i can only respond to questions ☹