Michael Posted May 16, 2014 Posted May 16, 2014 It's quite interesting really - In the past week schools received an e-mail encouraging them to take the connectivity upgrade from 10Mbps to 100Mbps, yet according to the feedback, it's pretty low on the agenda, with Office 365 high on the agenda. Link2ICT still aren't pushing Office 365, only evaluating/trialling and aren't offering it as an option (yet). This is one prime example of unnecessary delays when it could be put in place today. It's there, it works - I've been using it for 5 years... I think the document's a fair representation, but there's still a lot of work to do. They haven't performed 'excellent' overall in any of the categories, with 'good' topping all of them. Also (personally) I find it worrying that if we're still talking about transparent proxies and some of the other topics come October... 1
Michael Posted May 16, 2014 Posted May 16, 2014 It's an interesting read, my major concerns are the fact that no clear timescales are in place and the internet is still causing issues... I agree, no set timescales are an issue but unfortunately (depending how you look at it), Link2ICT are very much relying on Checkpoint to advise and support accordingly when problems occur. To review the logs it generates could take days or weeks depending on the nature of the problem. The only problem I have with this, is the firewall went in December 2013. If there are still stability problems come December 2014, I seriously think Link2ICT need to re-evaluate. New tools/features are coming in June, so it'll be interesting to see just how smoothly it goes when virtual controls will be offered to schools. Virtual controls are good and cheap, but they'll never replace a dedicated hardware appliance in every school. I don't think anyone can disagree with this statement, but if the virtual controls prove unreliable or limiting, what then?
Trojan Posted May 16, 2014 Posted May 16, 2014 Does anyone have a copy of the feedback document they can send me please as I'd really like to read it and I wasn't able to attend the session in the end. Thanks.
Michael Posted May 16, 2014 Posted May 16, 2014 I would apart from the attach function is broken on Edugeek using IE10 or Chrome 34. PM you e-mail address and I'll sent it over. 1
Trojan Posted May 16, 2014 Posted May 16, 2014 I would apart from the attach function is broken on Edugeek using IE10 or Chrome 34. PM you e-mail address and I'll sent it over. PM Sent
Trojan Posted June 12, 2014 Posted June 12, 2014 This just came through on ebriefing, lot's of "we will look at" and "pilot schemes" not much actual action ? http://ebriefing.bgfl.org/bcc_ebrief/content/resources/resource.cfm?id=10780&key=&zz=20140612083307599&zs=n 1
CHR1S Posted June 12, 2014 Posted June 12, 2014 This just came through on ebriefing, lot's of "we will look at" and "pilot schemes" not much actual action ? http://ebriefing.bgfl.org/bcc_ebrief/content/resources/resource.cfm?id=10780&key=&zz=20140612083307599&zs=n So very very underwhelmed! I wont go further into the continuing issue we are experiencing with L2ICT and now with other aspects of service Birmingham but my overall opinion is that one hand does not know what the other is doing!
Michael Posted June 12, 2014 Posted June 12, 2014 I think the fundamental problem is/was the lack of forward thinking. Every BGfL subscribing school has a Cisco 3550 which had its End of Life announced May 11th 2005, with the last date of support May 2nd 2011. If Link2ICT had planned ahead to upgrade those switches in batches, it wouldn't be such a big deal today, but instead a huge financial commitment is now required in a short period of time. If you compare the price of a Cisco 2960, it averages at about £500 per site, multiply that by the number of schools and you have a huge bill on your hands! They need to decide do we roll out transparent proxy support throughout (costing a lot), or roll it out slowly for sites that want it, making it logistically difficult managing two slightly different methods of deploying proxy support. As I say, if it had been better managed/thought out, we wouldn't be in this predicament today. The use of consumer devices has been on the rise for years, as well as the popularity or interest in BYOD, yet it's only now they're investigating. I'm pretty sure I logged calls discussing these issues over 2 years ago. Unfortunately I think my predictions were right. It is literally going to take another few years for Link2ICT to deploy all these new services by default. Time for plan B me thinks. 1
CHR1S Posted June 12, 2014 Posted June 12, 2014 My transparent proxy request was opened in 2012 and closed a year later - Spoke to Chris and advised that the call will be closed for now as there are no further updates on the transparent proxy. We are witing for the completion of the firewall migration. (sic) Hmmmmm
Trojan Posted June 12, 2014 Posted June 12, 2014 Time for plan B me thinks. I wish I had a plan B. What are the limiting factors to going it alone? * HR Portal * FCS Login * Payroll * CTF / ATF files Are these things what other people know of / are there others ?
eshaq786 Posted June 12, 2014 Posted June 12, 2014 Hr portal works outside of bgfl. For the others they say they are working on a solution using any comms plus but who knows how long that will be. In the mean time I am planning to have another adsl line from link and just use it on a standalone machine to get these files etc. well that's the plan.
foofighterjim Posted June 12, 2014 Posted June 12, 2014 I have proved that HR Portal works without the BGFL connection, quite what it would cost though is a different matter. FCS is the killer for me. 1
Michael Posted June 12, 2014 Posted June 12, 2014 I wish I had a plan B. What are the limiting factors to going it alone? * HR Portal * FCS Login * Payroll * CTF / ATF files Are these things what other people know of / are there others ? All shall be revealed in time Watch this space... 1
Michael Posted June 12, 2014 Posted June 12, 2014 What exactly does FCS do, can it be circumvented ? FCSLogin is basically secure FTP or SFTP and uses port 22 instead of the standard FTP port 21. Data's sent to an internally hosted server. As to what happens to it then, who knows! I can speculate some form of data geek manipulates it to their heart's content! 1
eshaq786 Posted June 12, 2014 Posted June 12, 2014 Revealed? Whats there to reveal. According to them they are proposing to use a software called Any Comms plus for secure ftp transfers. If you know of anything else it would be helpful to share it with the rest of us.
Trapper Posted June 17, 2014 Posted June 17, 2014 There must be a way to VPN for GroupCall and FCSLogin. How much are they charging for the Office 365 migration? I've had the bumf through today.
Tricky_Dicky Posted June 18, 2014 Posted June 18, 2014 There must be a way to VPN for GroupCall and FCSLogin. How much are they charging for the Office 365 migration? I've had the bumf through today. That's my thought. I can't be much being as it's a free service. It's purely a case of changing an MX record and doing a migrate after uploading a CSV of usernames. It does worry me how well they would do it though as when I phone up asking for any changes to do with Office365 it seems it's the first time they have ever heard of it.
apearce Posted June 18, 2014 Posted June 18, 2014 Yammer and other Office 365 functionality Yammer is a closed communication suite that is being integrated into Office 365 that would give a level of social networking within the school account, at an additional cost. Office 365 already has a range of messaging and discussion tools included that provide much of this functionality with no additional cost. If there is interest from schools to trial the Yammer integration, then we would look into this later in the autumn term. Taken from the e-briefing document - It stats that Yammer is at an additional cost. I'm interested to see how you may get charged for this as it is free within the Office 365 tenancy when it is enabled.
apearce Posted June 18, 2014 Posted June 18, 2014 Just so you are aware as well. Microsoft Student Advantage This is available as part of the paid for Microsoft 365 packages and allows Students to download full versions of the Office products. Student Advantage is also available to subscribers of the Microsoft EES agreement. This is quite correct either. The student advantage is part of your EES agreement and doesn't come as default with the Office 365 Tenancy. You have to contact your EES or Schools Agreement supplier to get a code which you then use as a voucher in your Office 365 tenancy.
Trojan Posted June 18, 2014 Posted June 18, 2014 Cost for a single primary school is prohibitive, add in firewall, filtering, support, licenses... Large secondary school here, cost would be no object as our link renewal was over £40k this year. (I'm fairly confident I could actually save money)
Michael Posted June 18, 2014 Posted June 18, 2014 There must be a way to VPN for GroupCall and FCSLogin. How much are they charging for the Office 365 migration? I've had the bumf through today. VPN is one solution, but I think it's inevitable Link2ICT are going to have to start opening these services too, or deploying alternatives due to school's migrating away to other ISPs. You then have to wonder what is the purpose of the BGfL at all. Providing school's with an internet connection is one thing, but being part of an intranet is kind of pointless. It has no impact on teaching or learning. You only have to look at bgfl.org to understand the funding no longer exists, yet for whatever reason it's still hosted. Interestingly I found out recently that Birmingham are the only LA who use Crisp - crisp.bgfl.org with every other LA using a different solution setup by Government years ago; but more to the point, it's accessible online for all and not just BGfL subscribers. If anyone can work out why Birmingham are different, I'd be happy to know! That's my thought. I can't be much being as it's a free service. It's purely a case of changing an MX record and doing a migrate after uploading a CSV of usernames. It does worry me how well they would do it though as when I phone up asking for any changes to do with Office365 it seems it's the first time they have ever heard of it. I suspect the migration cost will be based on the number of inboxes to migrate, but nothing's been published as you say. I suspect staff will have some form of training, but then you could also argue you could take ownership, learn it yourself, delegate some roles to teachers (such as password resetting, or e-mail creation etc..) and be done with external support. Taken from the e-briefing document - It stats that Yammer is at an additional cost. I'm interested to see how you may get charged for this as it is free within the Office 365 tenancy when it is enabled. I think some parts of Yammer are free, but others chargeable. I can't see how schools can trial it as it's blocked under BGfL. Again you have to wonder when people publish articles, do they actually check school's can actually trial it?
apearce Posted June 18, 2014 Posted June 18, 2014 I think some parts of Yammer are free, but others chargeable. I can't see how schools can trial it as it's blocked under BGfL. Again you have to wonder when people publish articles, do they actually check school's can actually trial it? Office 365 Education with A2 and above will come with Yammer Enterprise at no addition cost.
Michael Posted June 18, 2014 Posted June 18, 2014 Office 365 Education with A2 and above will come with Yammer Enterprise at no addition cost. Who knows then why it would be an additional cost, but if you look here Yammer are quoting prices. I think there's a Basic and Enterprise version (is my understanding) - maybe some Secondary establishments might be interested in such services?
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