[sims] Remote Desktop, FMS reports + printer error

[edutech4schools]

Hi all,

 

I have set up remote desktop + gateway so the bursar can work from home on FMS. Everything works as expected except when she goes to reports she gets an error (do not have error message to hand) which relates to needing to be connected to a printer.

 

From home she has connected her home printer which gets listed as a remote printer in her remote desktop, but this does not fix the issue. Next while at home I got her to select the XPS document writer but this appears on her desktop as 'remote XPS document writer' and does not work in FMS.

 

What am I missing.

[SBennett]

It might be worth checking if the printer has been set to default. I know from experience that FMS does not like it when there is no default printer set.

[edutech4schools]

I have been checking and double checking that with her. Not something I can physically check as it is all set up at her home, but she informs me that it is.

[SBennett]

Does she need to be able to print it to home? Could you not connect to a printer in the school and get her to print to that so that when she comes in she can just collect it? Without the error code, it is kinda hard to tell what the issue is.

[edutech4schools]

She does need to print it at home. She prints a report and then ticks of items as she works, or something like that.

[SBennett]

Do you have a usb printer lying around to test it out on? See if you can personally replicate the issue and then if you can't show her the exact way you did it.

[Rawns]

FMS is extremely temperamental with printers and remote access. Other apps will pick it up just fine, but FMS won't unless you load something else first. Get your Bursar to load Word up first before FMS and then go to File | Print and check it's picked up her home printer. If it has, leave Word open and then load FMS which will magically also pick up the home printer. We have this issue in our TS environment and FMS won't pick up the printers unless Word is ran first.

[vikpaw]

i was going to suggest something similar. make sure the home printer is default for the work computer, which can only be done after connection. she might just be checking it's default at home, which it most likely is.

[JHLEHS]

We too have the same problem at our school, capita has remoted in and failed, this has been a problem for years which capita should of fixed by now. I tried so many different things, the only thing that worked permanently for me was to add a dummy local printer to the workstation. This isn't the best soultion but worked for us as we only have 6 computers that run FMS. We have given up running it on our TS and we have had far too many problems.

[edutech4schools]

I did get it all fixed and working at 5 different schools. Main issues when installing and using FMS on a remote desktop server are,

 

1. dll files. after installing fms copy the full c:program files/sims/fms folder from a working computer over the one installed on the remote desktop server.

 

2. more dll file issues. copy dll files from system32 and the 64bit folder from a working computer over the ones installed on the remote desktop server. look on these forums for exact dll files to copy.

 

3. Installing FMS on to a remote desktop server fms does not create correct user rights on the c drive folder and the c:program files/sims/fms. As a fudge/test both these locations needs to be full control for the fms user. If you do not want to give full control to the c drive search these forums for 'fms report error dbe' and it will explain how to move a file that gets created by the database on the c drive to another location.

 

4. On the remote desktop server install a school printer (can be network) and make this the default. then make the same printer the default from remote desktop session.