ifarmery Posted September 10, 2015 Posted September 10, 2015 Hello I've read previously but cannot find it after endless searching, that there were some additions needed to the SIMS Permissions script/GPO to allow the Exams module to update successfully as a Staff member and not requiring and Admin logon. I seem to think it was some registry keys that needed modifying but not sure which. Can anybody help with this? Thank you Ian
kennysarmy Posted September 10, 2015 Posted September 10, 2015 Hello I've read previously but cannot find it after endless searching, that there were some additions needed to the SIMS Permissions script/GPO to allow the Exams module to update successfully as a Staff member and not requiring and Admin logon. I seem to think it was some registry keys that needed modifying but not sure which. Can anybody help with this? Thank you Ian We are on SOLUS2 and whenever we push out a SIMS update it breaks the exams module! It's been going on for years and it unlikely to be fixed - we've been fobbed off by Capita saying it's an environmental issue - but plenty other have reported it. - - - Updated - - - http://www.edugeek.net/forums/mis-systems/34180-exams-organiser-errors-after-every-upgrade.html http://www.edugeek.net/forums/mis-systems/79762-exams-organiser-automation-error.html
ifarmery Posted September 10, 2015 Author Posted September 10, 2015 Thank you, they were the threads I'd seen, I was sure id seen a fix, obviously not!
CAM Posted September 10, 2015 Posted September 10, 2015 The fix is to re-install the SIMS client on the affected workstation.
kennysarmy Posted September 10, 2015 Posted September 10, 2015 The fix is to re-install the SIMS client on the affected workstation. Of course, let's all re-install software on 100's of computers every time there is an update - that's not a FIX! - that's a FUDGE!!!
rrrrr Posted September 10, 2015 Posted September 10, 2015 We have the same, usually reinstall after upgrade. Luckly we only have a couple of computers used for accessing exams
CAM Posted September 11, 2015 Posted September 11, 2015 Of course, let's all re-install software on 100's of computers every time there is an update - that's not a FIX! - that's a FUDGE!!! I didn't say it was a pleasant fix. It seems to be the only solution to the problem though. Thankfully it is intermittent and doesn't always happen to me!
PhilNeal Posted September 11, 2015 Posted September 11, 2015 I have posted on this before. The only time we can get an upgrade fail is when Exams has been left open during the upgrade - easy to do. S3 has the power to deal with the issue - S2 cannot. Exams is not normally needed on 100s of machines?
vikpaw Posted September 13, 2015 Posted September 13, 2015 Always used to happen even when it wasn't logged in because the user running sims on said client never had perms to update the relevant files. Running as admin would do the trick, no reinstall required. This is going back 10+ years though, though from the many threads it's obviously still an issue. As it was only 1 PC that had exams on, it wasn't such a big fudge. It looks like you need to give local admin rights to any SIMS user who uses a PC that might be used to run Exams, or, get SOLUS3 running, which will basically update the client PCs with sufficient rights to do the upgrade.
ITGURU Posted September 13, 2015 Posted September 13, 2015 We've always had the 'Automation Error' when launching the Exams module after a SIMS release update. However, I assign Full Control over the SIMS.net folder in programs files for the staff user group so not a permission issue. Also, it's not because a user is in the exams module as I always change the SQL network properties so that only the server can access the database to update. Then I re-name the tcp settings for users to run the update.
kennysarmy Posted September 14, 2015 Posted September 14, 2015 We've always had the 'Automation Error' when launching the Exams module after a SIMS release update. However, I assign Full Control over the SIMS.net folder in programs files for the staff user group so not a permission issue. Also, it's not because a user is in the exams module as I always change the SQL network properties so that only the server can access the database to update. Then I re-name the tcp settings for users to run the update. I'm sure Phil Neal will argue against this....
ITGURU Posted September 14, 2015 Posted September 14, 2015 I'm sure Phil Neal will argue against this.... Capita told me that there is no fix for it apart from a re-install as they are unable to replicate the issue. I'm sure if either of the 2 things I mentioned were an issue it would be able to be replicated.
kennysarmy Posted September 14, 2015 Posted September 14, 2015 Capita told me that there is no fix for it apart from a re-install as they are unable to replicate the issue. I'm sure if either of the 2 things I mentioned were an issue it would be able to be replicated. Mate, it's been on-going for years - if they really wanted to fix it they would n't need to replicated it - enough schools have this issue - all they'd have to do would be to send an engineer to some sites to try and diagnose....
vikpaw Posted September 14, 2015 Posted September 14, 2015 Full control over sims folder won't work. Make the user a local administrator and give that a try. Though with UAC even this might not work, i've not had to use exams since before Win7.
PhilNeal Posted September 14, 2015 Posted September 14, 2015 Unless something can be replicated it can't be fixed. We have visited schools but it is after the event which is no good in understanding the issue.
Cache Posted September 14, 2015 Posted September 14, 2015 (edited) Also, it's not because a user is in the exams module as I always change the SQL network properties so that only the server can access the database to update. Then I re-name the tcp settings for users to run the update. I don't think that's the issue though, they could leave Exams open even when you disable access to the database can't they? It just won't work (although I may have misunderstood) Edited September 14, 2015 by Cache
PhilNeal Posted September 14, 2015 Posted September 14, 2015 You are correct. It is not the SQL connection that is the issue.
vikpaw Posted September 15, 2015 Posted September 15, 2015 Hang on, how is Exams being left open affecting the upgrade? After an upgrade to the server, client runs SIMS and this tries to update and in the background Exams was open? I don't think this is happening at all the schools that get this. Client PC is running Exams and possibly SIMS when server upgrade is initiated - this could affect the upgrade, but you'd know. If you break the connection, server updates fine, then it's down to case one about when sims is next run on the client. To recreate, it should be relatively straight forward at any school that uses pre-built images that have an old version of SIMS on. Set up a machine with the old image, run SIMS as low level user and see Exams not upgrade properly.
PhilNeal Posted September 15, 2015 Posted September 15, 2015 We have recreated the scenario of opening Exams from SIMS. Going back to SIMS and closing it. Exams remains open. If you do the upgrade at this point you will get this error. 1
vikpaw Posted September 15, 2015 Posted September 15, 2015 We have recreated the scenario of opening Exams from SIMS. Going back to SIMS and closing it. Exams remains open. If you do the upgrade at this point you will get this error. I can well believe this. I'm sure that this probably happens as well. However, after plenty of years of this happening and plenty of threads here and no doubt on SupportNet - people know that they should be totally out of SIMS and any linked programs. I know when it happened to us, the PC, it was only 1, was shutdown, it was in a locked room, and most times i'd have to wait for the exams officer to be in and allow us entry in order to run the update. If you can recreate keeping Exams open, next time can you close Exams, but reduce the user permissions to restricted?
kennysarmy Posted December 8, 2015 Posted December 8, 2015 Oh look - I must have done a SIMS upgrade last night from home..... Hi Jeff, I can no longer access the exams module - will you have to re-install sims to fix this? Sue
kennysarmy Posted December 8, 2015 Posted December 8, 2015 Using SOLUS3? No, SOLUS2 - following the worksheet sent out by Gloucestershire LEA SIMS Support!
PhilNeal Posted December 8, 2015 Posted December 8, 2015 @kennysarmy - thanks. You might be pleased to know that we're beginning the task of re-writing Exams!
FishCustard Posted December 21, 2015 Posted December 21, 2015 (edited) @kennysarmy - thanks. You might be pleased to know that we're beginning the task of re-writing Exams! This is good news! In the meantime, the issue is caused by various DLLs that the Exams module relies on not being registered properly. What you need to do is make sure that they get re-registered after a SIMS update - it seems from looking at Process Monitor traces that all the DLLs in the SIMS directory starting with 'CES' need registering. Along with those are two .NET libraries - these need to be passed to RegAsm in order for it to create the COM wrapper around them (the rest go to regsvr32). A PowerShell snippet like this will take care of it - if you use a script to deploy & update SIMS itself it can be integrated into that. # This path may be different for your environment! $regAsmPath = "C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\RegAsm.exe" # Ditto - change this to wherever SIMS is installed $simsPath = "C:\Program Files (x86)\SIMS\SIMS .net" Get-ChildItem $simsPath -filter "CES*.dll" | %{ & regsvr32 /s $_.FullName } & $regAsmPath "$simsPath\LoginProcesses.dll" /nologo /silent & $regAsmPath "$simsPath\DocManagementProcesses.dll" /nologo /silent Edited December 21, 2015 by FishCustard 2
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