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Posted
What about Fingertips? We have that here (never used it myself mind). Sure they said you just use it as normal when not on wifi etc and you just get it to update when back on a connection.
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Posted
What about Fingertips? We have that here (never used it myself mind). Sure they said you just use it as normal when not on wifi etc and you just get it to update when back on a connection.

 

It's end of line Dec 15 and users are being migrated to 2Simple according to this Fingertips Online

thanks though.

Posted
But it won't work offline which we need :(

Oh yes sorry I wasn't specifically responding to your post, just updating my previous post about my experiences with 2Build A Profile.

 

Agreed, Tapestry does not work offline, however you can take photos with your tablet/phone and create the observations later when you have a connection. Personally I would prefer to do that than wrestle with 2Build. (According to Tapestry its a design decision to stop people storing pupil data on mobile devices).

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Posted

In reality, most teachers take photos on the devices then sort out the observation later. In reality, they're too busy to actually type anything up in front of the children.

This means having ubiquitous Wi-Fi is less of an issue, so long as there's Wi-Fi in the classroom you'll be fine with tapestry.

That said, tapestry doesn't cope well with flakey wifi, and will just time out and lose an observation of the internet connection drops.

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Posted
In reality, most teachers take photos on the devices then sort out the observation later.

Yes, I just went and asked our FS teachers how they use it and they do exactly this (observations are actually usually sorted out at home in the evening!).

Posted
In reality, most teachers take photos on the devices then sort out the observation later. In reality, they're too busy to actually type anything up in front of the children.

This means having ubiquitous Wi-Fi is less of an issue, so long as there's Wi-Fi in the classroom you'll be fine with tapestry.

That said, tapestry doesn't cope well with flakey wifi, and will just time out and lose an observation of the internet connection drops.

 

We too operate a dual-reality network, along with wifi that has the potential to be flaky depending on what's trending on youtube.

@sparkeh doesn't taken photos on the device then dealing with them later, create the problem of storing data locally? Also can you please expand on wrestle - is it a chore...?

Posted
We too operate a dual-reality network, along with wifi that has the potential to be flaky depending on what's trending on youtube.

@sparkeh doesn't taken photos on the device then dealing with them later, create the problem of storing data locally? Also can you please expand on wrestle - is it a chore...?

Well, it means that there are photos of unnamed children on the tablets yes, but compare that to storing observations that name the children and their class!

 

We had endless problems with the app. Firstly it was so, so slow when running on recommended hardware. For some reason a design decision was made to load every applicable photo when you changed pages in the app. So, it was fine to start with but as the pics built up it slowed down to an unacceptable level, teachers would change the page then walk off and do something else until the page loaded. Secondly it crashed, a lot. Someone actually came out to see us from 2Simple but they couldn't help, he got the developers on the phone but still couldn't seem to do anything to help. So we ditched it and moved to Tapestry and the teachers love it.

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Posted (edited)
Well, it means that there are photos of unnamed children on the tablets yes, but compare that to storing observations that name the children and their class!

 

We had endless problems with the app. Firstly it was so, so slow when running on recommended hardware. For some reason a design decision was made to load every applicable photo when you changed pages in the app. So, it was fine to start with but as the pics built up it slowed down to an unacceptable level, teachers would change the page then walk off and do something else until the page loaded. Secondly it crashed, a lot. Someone actually came out to see us from 2Simple but they couldn't help, he got the developers on the phone but still couldn't seem to do anything to help. So we ditched it and moved to Tapestry and the teachers love it.

 

It was a year ago now, but my previous primary were working with it quite hapilly on 10" galaxy tab 2. They were locked down with a free app from the app store and set up with just 3 apps on the home screen and no access to the app drawer, facilitated by the lockdown software. The 3 apps were 2build a profile, camera, and browser. The staff weren't happy about it, they thought they were getting a toy they could use at home, not a tool that was locked to school wifi and only had the apps they needed to the job the tablets were bought to do.

 

I also experienced the crashes and slowness, but I used android assistant to schedule a silent cache clean up every 24 hours and the crashes pretty much stopped.

 

As far as I know, they are still using it.

Edited by Oaktech
Fake Monday. Cannot tipe
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Posted
We went with tapestry because it pretty much did the same thing at a tiny fraction of the price of 2simple.

I know you :)

A tiny fraction? interesting. we've now got Early Essence set up, so are trialling it.

Posted
I know you :)

A tiny fraction? interesting. we've now got Early Essence set up, so are trialling it.

 

Yes you do :p

 

Yeah 2simple was over £1000. Tapestry was £145. We have the license for 120 kids.

Posted
Wow, 2 Build a Profile for early years, more than 3 devices for one year, is £300 according to their website. I'm assuming it means a one year licence, rather than only 1 year group. That was with no add-ons. Maybe you get other things, or there are hidden charges.
Posted
Unless they have changed their pricing structure... we were looking before summer last year, so almost a year ago now. I can't find the e-mails about it (too many office 365 transfers and outlook profile disasters!!) haha! Maybe it was for 5 years £1200.... still tapestry was £145 for the first year and £120 after... so still almost half the price.
Posted

We need offline though, they'll do it all on a device then just sync up when in zone.

I haven't looked into if it all gets added to the camera roll, they will be personal (school bought) devices.

I'll see how the testing goes, but until we have decent coverage and reliable speed Tapestry is out. It was one of the first thing they looked at though.

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