Simmy Posted October 3, 2013 Posted October 3, 2013 Hi all, I have just started as ICT manager at a primary school and the deputy head has been having problems logging into SIMS in her office. Apparently the school contacted OneConnect about this months and OneConnect came in yesterday, installed a new machine for the bursar and gave the bursar's machine to the deputy head. They said that as she could connect to SIMS on the bursars old machine, when they put this in her office she will be able to connect in her room. But when she tries to connect she is getting the error message "SIMS has stopped working" "A problem caused the program to stop working correctly. Windows will close the program and notify you if a solution is available" Now firstly OneConnect have replaced the bursar's machine with a very similar one and the one they have given to the deputy is also very similar so I do not understand why they have decided to change it in the first place but this was done prior to me starting so nothing I can do about this now. Anyway the tech from OneConnect came, installed the new machine, swapped the deputy's and when she got the error message said it must be a network problem and off he went. I have checked the network which is absolutely fine. The deputy can connect occasionally which makes me wonder if she is getting the error message if 1 or more users are also logged into SIMS? Can't believe the cheek of OneConnect to install a machine very similar to the one already in place and charge us a small fortune for it then disappear when the initial problem has not been rectified. Any help on this error message would be very much appreciated. Also has anyone else had problems with OneConnect? I am currently looking into alternative providers as their prices are ridiculous.
Rawns Posted October 3, 2013 Posted October 3, 2013 That error is usually more of a "generic windows" error then a specific SIMS one. SIMS will usually throw out an error message, error fault code and details on the error. In the first instance, a reinstall of .NET 4 and SIMS .net would be the best bet, then try again.
psydii Posted October 3, 2013 Posted October 3, 2013 They shouldnt be able to charge if they didn't demonstrate that their solution solved the problem. It's been a while since I used sims, but my recollection was that it did crash if there was a network problem between the client application and the SQL server. It might be worth using psping across the connection to monitor it's stability.
Simmy Posted October 3, 2013 Author Posted October 3, 2013 That error is usually more of a "generic windows" error then a specific SIMS one. SIMS will usually throw out an error message, error fault code and details on the error. In the first instance, a reinstall of .NET 4 and SIMS .net would be the best bet, then try again. Thanks for the reply but as the bursar had never had a problem with this when she had it I can't see this resolving it. I will try it however. Thank you
Simmy Posted October 3, 2013 Author Posted October 3, 2013 They shouldnt be able to charge if they didn't demonstrate that their solution solved the problem. It's been a while since I used sims, but my recollection was that it did crash if there was a network problem between the client application and the SQL server. It might be worth using psping across the connection to monitor it's stability. I will try this tomorrow. Thanks for the advice
twin--turbo Posted October 3, 2013 Posted October 3, 2013 One Connect... Cumbria?Lancs Is the sims server on your own site? Rob
Simmy Posted October 4, 2013 Author Posted October 4, 2013 Yes Lancs...sims server is on site too. Just tracing the network cabling back to see where it leads. Hopefully not to a switch then another switch.
psydii Posted October 4, 2013 Posted October 4, 2013 BTW if current users of sims are recommending re-installing .net 4 then I'd go with that as my first action. Also to my horror I notice that I wrote "it's" when I meant "its".
creese Posted October 4, 2013 Posted October 4, 2013 Also to my horror I notice that I wrote "it's" when I meant "its". Grammar police on their way...
jsmith001 Posted October 4, 2013 Posted October 4, 2013 Hi Simmy I am Operations and Incident Manager at One Connect Limited. I am concerned about your comments and need to address them. Can you let me know the name of your school and I will find out the background as to why the machine was left in this state. Please let me know at [email protected] Thank you 1
vikpaw Posted October 6, 2013 Posted October 6, 2013 It can't be an installation issue if the dep.head can connect sometimes. So the .net reinstall probably won't achieve anything, unless there is another program installed that is causing issues / conflicts. I'd look at networking, server side issues (is it a real server or just someone's machine?) etc. What happened to the dep.head's old PC if they had one? How many other SIMS users are there?
DavidLong Posted October 6, 2013 Posted October 6, 2013 Might be worth logging on to the pc with a new user account then trying to login to SIMS to see if there is anything in the deputy heads profile that is causing an issue.
kevin_lane Posted October 6, 2013 Posted October 6, 2013 Humm ok whole thing very strange personally I would go with 3 options being that sims is a windows application and the error your describing basically windows is making sims malfunction 1 Uninstall sims and delete sims out of the program folder and try reinstall 2 Uninstall sims and .net and reinstall .net first then windows updated 3 Rebuild os with sims and .net only no other apps
jsmith001 Posted October 8, 2013 Posted October 8, 2013 I have spoken to the engineer who was on site to install the new P2P server and now have more information on what happened. He is still sure that there is a localised networking issue (most likely the switch) that is affecting the SIMS connection and has advised that this needs to be checked first. A previous machine in the same location was experiencing the same intermittent errors so it is unlikely to be a software installation issue. The server was replaced in the last couple of weeks with a fresh OS and application install which should have ruled out a client/server fault. Hope this helps but feel free to get in touch, either direct or via the OCL helpdesk if you need any more information or support. Jonathan [email protected]
LosOjos Posted October 8, 2013 Posted October 8, 2013 Can the deputy head log in to SIMS on a different machine? I vaguely remember hearing of an issue a while back whereby the SIMS users permissions could become corrupted, causing regular SIMS crashes. You could try deleting all of the deputy head's SIMS permissions and then re-adding them to see if that's causing a problem. Also, I hate to be cynical, but have you physically watched them login and witnessed the error for yourself? I have to say, quite often staff are reluctant to admit they've forgotten their password and will blame the system...
kevin_lane Posted October 8, 2013 Posted October 8, 2013 Is the issue intermittent e.g random which isnt going to help alot also I would clare all events logs on the client and try and replicate the issue could it be a certain point he is going to in sims that is generating the issue also I would look at the sims server event logs and cross reference the time of the issue on to the server and see if that sheds any light
vikpaw Posted October 8, 2013 Posted October 8, 2013 Can the deputy head log in to SIMS on a different machine? I vaguely remember hearing of an issue a while back whereby the SIMS users permissions could become corrupted, causing regular SIMS crashes. You could try deleting all of the deputy head's SIMS permissions and then re-adding them to see if that's causing a problem. Also, I hate to be cynical, but have you physically watched them login and witnessed the error for yourself? I have to say, quite often staff are reluctant to admit they've forgotten their password and will blame the system... I can see those on the windows server event logs. Highly amusing to see when they typed in the wrong username, then they typed FU then something else. Or maybe it's only me that rants at login boxes when they don't work.
Simmy Posted October 9, 2013 Author Posted October 9, 2013 As I have been teaching all week the school called a network engineer out as OneConnect thought the problem was network related. He came out today and I have just spoken to him and he said he thinks it is a SIMS problem or a problem with the switch. He said the Cisco switch is flashing orange occasionally which is a common fault. He said as the switch is owned by OneConnect we should contact them about this which I will do when I get time (I am currently in the middle of an ICT after school club). I have however moved the computer from the main office that has never had a problem logging in to sims and tried this in the other office and still the same problem. Tried logging in as different users and all users work in the main office but not in the Deputy heads so it must be network related. Appologies to OneConnect by the way for my earlier comments. I was frustrated :-O I tried pinging the switch and reply was 1ms, 1ms, 1ms, 1ms, 2ms, 1ms, 1ms, 1ms, 1ms, and I got 1 14ms. Not sure if this would cause a problem? Thanks for all the comments by the way. I am confident I can get this resolved. This cisco switch is now concerning me though. Anyone had this problem? Looks like it is working fine and then it slowly flashes green then orange for about 10 seconds and then looks fine again? Network seems to be working fine
kevin_lane Posted October 9, 2013 Posted October 9, 2013 do you know if it happens at a particular point in the day ?
Simmy Posted October 9, 2013 Author Posted October 9, 2013 No. There is an 8 point switch in between the cisco switch and the machines so I changed this and tried logging in and got the error. Rebooted and it let me log in. 10 mins later user logged out and tried logging in again and wouldn't let them back in. Tried a few different times since and still not allowing log in. Very strange
kevin_lane Posted October 9, 2013 Posted October 9, 2013 The 8 port switch how old is it and can you log into it
Simmy Posted October 14, 2013 Author Posted October 14, 2013 Tried 2 switches and tried bypassing the 8 port switch so I go straight to the Cisco switch and same error so this problem cant be caused the 8 port switch. Contacted oneconnect last week about this cisco switch and awaiting a reply.
Simmy Posted December 2, 2013 Author Posted December 2, 2013 This has now been resolved. I bought a new 8 port switch (Netgear gigabit) and it is all working fine now
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